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U.S. Tries to Win Over Angry Indonesian Muslims
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THE NEW YORK TIMES
Saturday, June 22, 2002 |
U.S. Tries to Win Over Angry Indonesian Muslims
By JANE PERLEZ
GUNUNG TEMBAK, Indonesia — On the edge of the rich rain forests and gold mines
here in the world's most populous Muslim country, students at an Islamic boarding
school learn to abhor the United States.
The anti-American creed is not spelled out in the brochure that beckons students to
the Hidayatullah campus in Kalimantan, this mineral-studded province of Indonesia on
the island of Borneo. But on the campus, where an imposing mosque with a silvery
dome towers over scruffy school buildings, the antagonism toward America permeates
every discussion.
"From very deep in my heart I think the United States is evil," said Muhammad Fadhil,
a feisty 16-year-old, described by his teachers as one of the smartest students.
"There are too many interventions by the United States around the world. It
exaggerates its military force."
The Hidayatullah, one of the more extreme of Indonesia's religious boarding schools,
known as pesantrens, is the home base for a network of 120 branch schools
throughout the country. Like the madrasas in Pakistan, pesantrens are led by
charismatic leaders who strive to instill their version of Islamic values.
Now, as the United States scans the world for breeding grounds for Islamic
extremists, some Asia experts in the Bush administration say they are worried about
the changing face of religious schools in this nation of 220 million people. They
express concern about a "lost generation" of young radicalized Indonesian Muslims.
There is an urgent need for a soft sell by the United States, to win hearts and minds,
to complement the tough administration strategy of throwing support to militaries,
including the Indonesian Army, these experts contend.
To try and regain ground in the propaganda war, State Department officials say they
have come up with a new strategy: inviting leaders of pesantrens to the United States
for a show-and-tell two-week tour this summer, plus participation in a four-week
course on religious tolerance at the Institute for Training and Development at Amherst,
Mass.
The program is an effort to expose about 80 Islamic educators who might be
suspicious of the United States to the American way of life. "We will concentrate on
those who are receptive, who have not been to the United States and who have a
degree of open-mindedness," an American official said.
But winning people over will not be easy. "The idea is to make other religions
recognize Islam as it was in the Middle Ages," said Abdul Qadir Jakani, the chief
operating officer of the school here.
"More than 80 percent of Indonesians are Muslim but most of them only think of
themselves as Islamic from their identity card. We want to change that."
The pesantrens have generally been simple places, devoid of much militancy. But at
times in Indonesia's history, they have served as cells for mobilizing and indoctrinating
young warriors. Today, feelings about America are running high.
The Israeli-Palestinian conflict, and the United States support for Israel, figures high in
many students' statements. They believe, they said, that there is no tolerance
between Muslims and Jews in the United States. In the United States, said
Muhammad Sayyaf, 16, "The Muslims are hunted by the non-Muslims."
In their theology classes, the students are taught to defend Islam against the infidels,
Jews and Christians, and to strive to convert the infidels to their way of thinking. But
the students are also heavily influenced by a cheap and strident anti-American
mass-circulation magazine, Sabili, which characterizes Osama bin Laden as a hero.
Television is banned at the school, and computer use is very limited. Some boys said
they slipped out to an Internet cafe in the nearby village to look at the Web site of
Laskar Jihad, the militant Indonesian Islamic group. The group was involved in the
recent killing of Christians in the Molucca Islands.
Muhammad Fadhil said he devoured issues of Sabili, his main source of current
affairs. He learned from the magazine, he said, that George Soros is a Hungarian Jew
who runs the American economy; that Bill Clinton was once governor of Arkansas and
had an affair with Monica Lewinsky; and that 4,000 Jews who worked in the World
Trade Center took a holiday on Sept. 11.
For all their invective, Mr. Fadhil and his classmates were friendly to an outsider and
curious about the United States. When asked what they knew about the United
States, Muhammad Arifin, 16, shot back: Britney Spears. Another said Clint Mathis,
the American soccer star.
Then came the questions. "How come the United States supports Israel?" asked one.
"What were people doing in so many floors of the World Trade Center?" asked
another. And then: "Why is Milosevic a violator of human rights, but Ariel Sharon is
not? Sharon killed a lot of people when he was head of the army."
Several boys said that, if approached, they would join Al Qaeda or Laskar Jihad.
Others demurred, saying they did not like violence.
Like many pesantrens, Hidayatullah began as the dream of its founder, Abdullah Said.
He believed that the money from the timber and oil companies was ruining both the
environment and the moral values of young Muslims in Kalimantan. In the early
1970's, he borrowed a farmer's hut in this village 20 miles from Balikpapan, East
Kalimantan's capital, and used it as a sanctuary for study and prayer. In 1976, he
opened the school and mosque on a 100-acre site.
Since the founder's death two years ago, this pesantren, and its subsidiaries, have
become more strident in its teachings. Its Web site and magazine have lashed out at
Indonesia's moderate Muslim leaders. A cover of a recent issue read, "Israel at 54,
the savage country."
The more aggressive stance, combined with the conservative interpretation of Islam,
has prompted some moderate Muslims to ask whether the Hidayatullah schools
receive funds from Saudi Arabia. Photographs of official visitors from Saudi Arabia,
including a Saudi Arabian ambassador to Indonesia, are displayed on the school's
notice board.
The school's administrators denied they received money from abroad. They survive,
they said, on modest fees from parents, about $15 a month, and a modicum of
support from the Indonesian government.
The rudimentary facilities suggest that the finances, at least, are limited. The girls and
boys are kept separate. The boys sleep in small rooms. One long wooden bench
covered with linoleum — no mattress — accommodates 10 boys.
The girls wear long veils, though most do not cover their faces. They sleep on hard
wood too, though they have individual bunk beds in pleasant light-filled dormitories. (In
contrast to the prudish behavior codes, however, a teacher asked a visitor to give an
impromptu talk to her English class on AIDS and its causes.)
The school takes seriously what it sees as its obligation to propagate Islam.
Graduates are encouraged to marry one another, and to participate in mass
weddings. They are then instructed to go out and establish new schools.
In the last several months, Indonesia's Muslim politicians have begun to ramp up their
appeal to voters on a religious basis, and the pesantrens are part of the political
circuit. The vice president of Indonesia, Hamza Haz, who leads the biggest
Muslim-based political party, visited Hidayatullah last month.
Mr. Hamza, who has gone out of his way to support the militant Laskar Jihad, left
behind a $2,000 check earmarked for the expansion of the mosque, school officials
said.
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