Bali tragedy may deal fatal blow to violent Islamism

Bali tragedy may deal fatal blow to violent Islamism

Martin Woollacott, Guardian News Service, London

After the massacre of foreign tourists at Luxor in 1997, the
shock and grief felt by Egyptians was tangible. The journalist
and academic Geneive Abdo describes leaving the relatively quiet
campus of the American University in Cairo to find that "all
around me, Egyptians were cursing the violence. They stood in
crowds in the middle of downtown, waving their hands in the air
and looking past one another as they shouted in anger and
frustration".

The spectacular violation of Egyptian ideas of decency and
hospitality by the Luxor terrorists turned the population
decisively against a violent Islamism about which they already
had grave doubts. The main radical Islamist movements in that
country condemned the attack, went on to the defensive, and began
a reconsideration of strategy.

In retrospect Luxor can be seen as the last desperate throw of
the terrorist brand of Islamism in Egypt. A slow Islamization of
Egyptian society continued, which many westerners and secular
Egyptians deplore, but it has nevertheless been pursued by non-
violent means. Most of those who could not reconcile themselves
to this course left the country, some of them to become founders
and associates of what came to be known as al-Qaeda.

Five years after Luxor, it looks as if al-Qaeda and its local
allies in Indonesia have repeated the same mistake in Bali. Just
as Luxor alienated Egyptians from the path of violence, so it is
likely that Bali will have the same effect on Muslim Indonesians.
Extreme Islamists are far less a force in Indonesia than they
once were in Egypt, and their chances of increasing their
influence must be narrowed by what has happened.

The operation that al-Qaeda and its helpers have chosen to
conduct illustrates the almost unavoidable contradiction between
national political objectives and the kind of transnational war
on the west and its friends which al-Qaeda's leadership, whatever
remains of it, wishes to conduct.

This broader war may be served by a blow which shows that
young westerners enjoying themselves abroad are very vulnerable;
and so is an Indonesian economy dependent on income from tourism,
in particular that from Bali. There are potentially scores of
such targets all over the globe and the impact will go well
beyond Indonesia to damage the tourist trade of many other
countries. But, as a tactic designed to gain political power in
Indonesia, Bali is deeply dubious.

The objective of the more extreme Islamist groups in Southeast
Asia is supposedly a Muslim superstate uniting Indonesia,
Malaysia, parts of the Philippines and Thailand. But the way
there, if we give this fantasy room for a moment, would have to
be through the achievement of political control in Indonesia and
Malaysia as at present constituted.

Quite apart from the non-Muslim minorities in these countries
and the secularized parts of the middle classes, any serious
Islamist has to take into account the needs and views of the mass
of ordinary Muslims. Bombs in Bali are not a way to gain
influence in a complex polity where there are substantial
moderate Muslim political movements.

The interests of ordinary Muslims as they see them, it may be
hazarded, do not include the destruction of livelihoods, the
collapse of local economies, or the slaughter of guests in one's
own home.

This last is a critical point of difference to the twin towers
attack, and to strikes against tankers, warships or embassies.
Justifications can be offered for, and conspiracy theories woven
around, such events. It is not so easy to do this when innocents
have been killed in your own country.

Abu Bakar Ba'aysir, the leader of Jemaah Islamiyah, has made
statements implying that the U.S. might have a motive for the
Bali bombs, but it remains to be seen whether this notion will
gain any credence among Indonesians, however jaundiced their view
of America.

Above all, events such as Luxor and Bali have the potential to
greatly increase the kind of informal social policing that is the
only really effective basis for preventing terrorist activity. It
is true that the situation in Indonesia is complicated by serious
strains between a central government of a somewhat secular
character, a resentful army, and a number of disappointed Muslim
groups, some moderate and some not.

Ethnic and confessional strife, fomented by elements in the
military who use such conflict as a way of dominating whole
islands and regions, has marked the lackadaisical presidency of
Megawati Soekarnoputri.

Violence in Hindu Bali might be thought to fit into such a
pattern, but its consequences may signal an improvement in it,
with the bombs producing a different approach at all three points
of the triangle. Government, army and radical groups cannot
proceed, after Bali, as they did before.

The government will have to respond to the American urgings it
seems to have resisted and ignored until now. The games played by
army commanders will be under more serious surveillance. Radicals
will be under pressure both from the security forces pursuing
them for real or alleged involvement in violence, and from within
their own ranks. In none of this should there be much comfort for
al-Qaeda or its Indonesian associates.

The Brazilian guerrilla Carlos Marighella defined the classic
terrorist strategy as "turning political crisis into armed
conflict by performing violent actions that will force those in
power" into a military response "that will alienate the masses".
It is an old thought and an old trap, but people -- and nations
-- still fall into it.

There have been warnings that too militarized a response to
the Bali bombs could play into such a strategy. It is interesting
that Luxor was followed by a limited relaxation of Egypt's very
repressive methods. The government was blamed for not having
responded to ceasefire offers by extremist groups, and perhaps
having missed an opportunity to divide them. Now it tacked in
that direction, releasing repentant extremists from jail. For
whatever combination of reasons, it worked. There were no more
Luxors, Egyptian politics changed, and, in time, Egyptian tourism
recovered from the impact of the killings.

Before Bali, some knowledgeable people criticized the U.S. for
exaggerating the extent to which extremist Islam had penetrated
the region. There is no obvious reason now to deem them wrong.
One big operation that came off and one that was foiled -- the
planned attack on targets in Singapore -- do not prove that al-
Qaeda and its friends are everywhere.

Rather, they suggest that they have to go to new places and
pick new targets in order to succeed, and it will not be so easy
a second time around. In these dangerous times it does not do to
be too sanguine, but it is to be hoped they will also show that a
big "success" at one level can also be a big failure at another.