DEFENDERS OF THE FAITHFUL: DEWAN DAKWAH ISLAMIYAH

C O N F I D E N T I A L SECTION 01 OF 04 JAKARTA 000660 SIPDIS SIPDIS E.O. 12958: DECL: 03/08/2012 TAGS: PHUM PGOV KISL PREL SOCI ID SUBJECT: DEFENDERS OF THE FAITHFUL: DEWAN DAKWAH ISLAMIYAH INDONESIA (DDII) REF: A. 06 STATE 181045 (KOMPAK DESIGNATION) ¶B. 06 JAKARTA 3159 (PORNOGRAPHY BILL) Classified By: Political Officer Catherine E. Sweet, Reason 1.4(d) ¶1. (C) Summary. On February 22, we met with the Executive Board of Dewan Dakwah Islamiyah Indonesia (DDII),a historically important hard-line Islamist group whose charitable wing, KOMPAK, has been linked to Jemaah Islamiyah (JI). DDII, which has a reputation for being anti-West, anti-Semitic and pro-conspiracy theory, has been a channel for Saudi funding and doctrine in Indonesia since the 1950s, although it generally lacks ties to other international Islamist groups. According to Chairman Hussein Umar, DDII is primarily concerned with carrying out dakwah (proselytization) to Islamize Indonesia, albeit within the parameters of the constitution. While acknowledging that KOMPAK's local branch was linked to "activities" in Poso, Central Sulawesi, Umar asserted that the branch was acting independently; he said that KOMPAK had since been dissolved (The Asia Foundation's Islam expert, Robin Bush, and the International Crisis Group's Sidney Jones dispute this). Asked about allegations that KOMPAK members had participated in terrorist training camps in the Philippines, Umar replied that "we do not know who goes to the Philippines or what they do, but we did not order it." Umar expressed sympathy for Abu Bakar Ba'asyir's doubts about Muslim involvement in the 2002 Bali bombing, but unequivocally condemned the use of terror and denounced those Arab religious leaders who condone suicide bombings (notably Al-Jazeera's Shaykh Qaradawi and the clerics at Cairo's Al-Azhar University). Umar said that DDII is concerned with Muslim human rights worldwide, decrying the lack of "justice" in the Muslim world and calling the Iraq war a "wound" for Muslims. Finally, Umar lamented what he sees as an ongoing process of liberalization and secularization in Indonesia that is "marginalizing Islam." End Summary. ¶2. (C) On February 22, we met with the Executive Board of Dewan Dakwah Islamiyah Indonesia (DDII),a hard-line Islamist group whose charitable wing, KOMPAK, has been linked to Jemaah Islamiyah (JI). The visit was largely convivial, with even the standard tirades about U.S. foreign policy delivered politely by Chairman Hussein Umar (full participant list in para 16). The discussion made apparent that Umar and DDII are avid consumers of the transnational Islamist discourse of Muslim persecution and victimization at the hands of the Christian West. However, there was a staleness about their presentation that suggested DDII's time as a preeminent Islamist organization has come and gone. DDII's Objective: Spreading the Word -------------- ¶3. (C) Chairman Umar, who is recovering from open heart surgery, told us that DDII is primarily concerned with carrying out dakwah to Islamize Indonesia. He hastened to add that this would be done within the parameters of the constitution, saying that although DDII might have differences with the government, it did not seek to change the governmental system. When asked who DDII's target dakwah audience is, Umar replied that DDII works primarily within the Muslim community. He denied that DDII tries to convert individuals who practice other religions, although he readily admitted that people "without religion" are fair game (he specificially mentioned communities in Papua, Kalimantan -- especially the Dayak -- and the Sarawak border area with Malaysia as areas of real interest). ¶4. (C) Umar contrasted DDII's activities with what he called the "aggressive" behavior of Christians toward Muslims in Indonesia. He claimed that interfaith harmony was being disrupted because of the lack of a code of ethics governing proselytization, as well as unclear rules on the establishment of houses of worship. He told us that in the mid-1960s, the government convened a group of prominent religious leaders to discuss intercommunal tensions that had been brought about by proselytization across faiths. Specifically, he said, the Muslim community felt that Christian missionaries were taking over in areas like Makassar, South Sulawesi. At that meeting, the government proposed that proselytizing activities be limited to one's own community: in other words, Christians could only target other Christians, while Muslims could carry out dakwah only within the Muslim community. The initiative failed, he charged, because the Christian representatives would not agree to the terms. Umar asserted that as a Balinese, he values diversity, and he boasted about having Christian friends and even a Christian roommate once (although he JAKARTA 00000660 002 OF 004 commented that while he, Umar, prayed several times a day, the Christian rarely went to church). Umar also reminded us that under Islamic law, Christians and Jews must be protected. But, he claimed, without a law restricting interreligious proselytizing, there will only be chaos. He further alleged that Christian missionaries have access to funding that Muslim dakwah organizations like DDII do not, which necessarily tips the balance in the Christians' favor. KOMPAK: "We Don't Want to Be Involved in That" -------------- -- ¶5. (C) We inquired about DDII's charitable activity, and particularly that of KOMPAK, its charitable wing that was reportedly closed in 2004 following allegations of involvement in terrorist finance (ref A and previous). As he has in previous meetings, Umar again asserted that KOMPAK had been dissolved. He explained that KOMPAK (an acronym for the Crisis Management Committee) was founded in 1998 and said it was one of several DDII units that carried out humanitarian activity. He acknowledged that while KOMPAK was linked to "activities" in Poso, Central Sulawesi, he averred that DDII itself was not implicated. "We do not want to be involved in that," he stressed. Umar added that although KOMPAK's national chapter did provide humanitarian assistance to the strife-torn communities of Poso and Ambon, it was the local branch of KOMPAK that was causing trouble in Poso. "We did not even know about it," he claimed. ¶6. (C) Still, Umar offered up a half-hearted defense of KOMPAK, pointing out that it had worked with various prominent international humanitarian organizations on disaster relief. Asked about allegations that KOMPAK members had participated in terrorist training camps in the Philippines, Umar replied that "we do not know who goes to the Philippines or what they do, but we did not order it." KOMPAK's Poso branch was totally separate from KOMPAK's national organization, he claimed, and DDII shut the whole organization down when the Poso and national chapters were being conflated. Said Umar, DDII's policies are consistent with Islam, and are therefore peaceful. (Comment. There seemed to be a disconnect between the Executive Board and the membership, not just on KOMPAK but on other issues. Whether this is a willful disconnect, a refusal to acknowledge that DDII members are engaged in nefarious activities, or simply a sign that DDII's leadership does not have control over the organization, is less clear. End comment.) ¶7. (C) For their part, both the Asia Foundation's Robin Bush and the International Crisis Group's (IGC) Sidney Jones believe that KOMPAK still exists. In particular, Jones said, KOMPAK's branch in Central Sulawesi is currently active and implicated in the ongoing sectarian violence there. Furthermore, according to several ICG reports on intercommunal violence in Central Sulawesi, there are solid ties between Mujahidin KOMPAK and Jemaah Islamiya. Interestingly, Umar disparaged Sidney Jones during our meeting with him, claiming that she had never spoken to DDII to get their side of the story. "She would understand if she came, but she never has," Umar alleged. Umar Condemns Terrorism and Ulama Who Sanction It -------------- -------------- ¶8. (C) We asked Umar for his opinion on the terrorist attacks that have roiled Indonesia over the last six years. Umar replied that DDI rejects terrorism, especially since the people targeted in the attacks were innocent. At the same time, Umar expressed support for Abu Bakar Ba'asyir's conspiracy theory that non-Indonesians were responsible for the 2002 Bali bombing. According to this hypothesis, the explosion was too powerful to have been caused by anything that convicted bomber Amrozi could have gotten his hands on. Instead, the theory goes, this "micro-nuclear" or "C-4" explosion must have been detonated by a professional, since the inputs for such explosives cannot be found in Indonesia. Umar alleged that the former director of the Indonesian intelligence service, who he said was a Christian, has asserted that the CIA or Mossad was responsible for the attack. He also expressed concern that unspecified intelligence services were carrying out operations in Indonesia to "frame" Muslim hardliners. ¶9. (C) However, when we pressed him about other terrorist attacks where Muslims have admitted their culpability (such as Hasanuddin's confession to masterminding the beheading of three schoolgirls in Poso, Central Sulawesi),Umar was less equivocal. "He (Hasanuddin) must be executed," Umar declared. "Terrorism can never be supported by an JAKARTA 00000660 003 OF 004 institution like DDII," Umar continued, because it is inconsistent with dakwah. Umar then went a step further, and condemned Arab religious leaders who condone suicide bombings (notably citing Qatar-based Shaykh Qaradawi, whose Al-Jazeera program has wide viewership in the Muslim world, and the clerics at Cairo's Al-Azhar University). Defender of Muslims' Human Rights -------------- ¶10. (C) According to Umar, another DDII concern is human rights and particularly those of Muslims, both within Indonesia and around the world. He cited the ongoing conflicts in Iraq, Afghanistan, Palestine, Thailand and the southern Philippines as areas of notable concern, and he referred several times to a lack of "justice" in the Muslim world. Although he said that DDII does not have political ambitions, he argued that DDII, as part of the world's largest Muslim country, could not support any policies that were inconsistent with the principle of sovereignty and the will of the people. Umar spoke at some length about the war in Iraq, repeatedly describing it as a "wound" for Muslims. In his opinion, while many (Muslim) countries disagree with U.S. policy, they are not able to express their views. Nevertheless, he expressed hope that the problems in Iraq would end soon, and he called on the U.S. to "have a conscience about this." ¶11. (C) On the ongoing violence in Poso, Central Sulawesi, Umar said that it is fundamentally an economic conflict stemming from the problem of transmigration. He sees the Muslim community as particularly victimized, and claimed that Muslim lands that were confiscated and redistributed to transmigrants have not been returned. "There is still no justice for them," according to Umar. In his opinion, dialogue would be more effective than police action in resolving the dispute. He praised the 2001 Malino Accord as being "very good," but decried the fact that the government had not followed through with its pledges to improve everyday life in the Muslim community. Indonesia Becoming Too Liberal, Secular -------------- ¶12. (C) Umar spoke of the vastness of Indonesia's land and the richness of its natural resources. It is "a paradox," he lamented, "an enormous country with vast resources, yet people still queue for rice." Umar suggested that the U.S. might be better regarded in the eyes of the world if it used its power for good causes, like eliminating poverty in Indonesia (we pointed out that counterterrorism assistance is just a tiny portion of the aid the U.S. provides each year to Indonesia, while the vast majority is for developmental assistance). Umar conveyed DDII's interest in upholding Indonesian society's morals, mentioning the draft anti-pornography and pornographic actions legislation that has been hotly debated over the past year (ref B). Indonesia does not want to be like Holland, he asserted, where drugs, homosexuality and pornography are legal in accordance with its "so-called freedom." "There are limits to freedom," declared Umar. ¶13. (C) Umar said that DDII has no problem with the Shi'a community, which he said is very small in Indonesia, since their differences are limited to questions of Islamic law. The group of Muslims with whom DDII does take issue, he asserted, is the "ultra-liberal" Muslim community. He condemned what he termed ongoing liberalization and secularization in Indonesia, a process that he said began in the 1960s and was "marginalizing Islam." Oddly, Umar placed blame in large part on the Center for Strategic and International Studies, a prominent think tank which he alleged was led by a group of Catholic intellectual "extremists." (Note. Several of Indonesia's most respected Muslim scholars are affiliated with CSIS. End note.) Inheritors of the Maysumi Mantle -------------- ¶14. (SBU) As the Asia Foundation's Islam expert, Robin Bush, told us, DDII remains emotionally relevant to Indonesian political Islam because of its historical linkage to the Council of Indonesian Muslims, commonly known as Masyumi, an umbrella organization that the Japanese occupation authorities forced all Islamist groups to join in 1943. During Indonesia's independence struggle, Masyumi advocated on behalf of creating an explicitly Islamic state. After independence, President Sukarno, who rejected the notion of applying Islamic law, or sharia, used Masyumi as a JAKARTA 00000660 004 OF 004 counterbalance against the Indonesian Communist Party (PKI). The party was further weakened when the mass Muslim organization Nahdlatul Ulama (NU) broke away in 1952, instead endorsing Sukarno's vision of a secular Indonesia. Although Masyumi garnered just 21 percent of the vote in the 1955 elections, Sukarno forcibly dissolved the organization in the 1960s amidst fears of a rising Islamist threat, triggered in part by the Darul Islam separatist rebellion. Sukarno's successor, Suharto, was even harsher toward the Islamists than Sukarno, despite the fact that many Muslims supported the 1965 coup attempt that eventually brought Suharto to power. ¶15. (SBU) In 1967, Mohammad Natsir, one of the most important figures in Indonesia's revolutionary history, founded DDII. A former Masyumi chairman and prime minister from 1950-1951, Natsir established the organization to carry out dakwah, or proselytization, and charitable activities after he was effectively banned by Suharto from participating in politics (Natsir quipped that Suharto considered Islamists to be like "cats with ringworm"). Many of DDII's founding hard-line leaders died during the Suharto regime; what remained of the group fragmented after Suharto fell, with many opting to join the multitude of new Islamist political parties like the Crescent Star Party (PBB),the United Development Party (PPP),National Mandate Party (PAN),and the Justice Party (PK, which later became the Prosperous Justice Party, or PKS). Since the 1950s, DDII has been a channel for Saudi funding in Indonesia, and the organization tends to follow the Saudis' lead on issues of doctrine. For example, DDII instructed its followers to observe Idul Adha, whose date varies according to the lunar calendar, on the day designated by the Saudi authorities. By contrast, Indonesia's mainstream Muslim organizations, who used astronomy and lunar sightings to fix the holiday's start date, celebrated Idul Adha one day later. For the most part, DDII has been primarily focused on Indonesia and generally lacks ties to other international Islamist groups. DDII does have, however, a reputation for being anti-West, anti-Semitic and pro-conspiracy theory. Participants: -------------- ¶16. (U) Hussein Umar, Chairman Drs. Mohammad Siddik, Executive Director, DDII National Zakat Institute Amlir Saifa, Secretary, DDII Ma'mun Dawud, Treasurer, DDII National Zakat Institute Drs. Zahir Khan, Chairman, Yayasan Persaudaraan ¶H. Hardi Arifin, Treasurer, Yayasan Pendidikan Islam Ibn Khaldun Bogor Mas'adi Sulthani, Chairman, DDII Central Board HEFFERN