I find it sad that the straw that broke the camel's back was an attack on Russia, after all of the attacks on Jews and Americans.

At least the Muslim world is beginning to fight this movement. One still has to wonder how these commentators feel about the murder of Israeli children. Many might still call that justified.

FYI, the current issue of Time has some interesting perspectives on the rise and occassional waning of violence in Islam.

"First the Saturday people, then the Sunday people"
-Common Arab phrase heard at many "protests"

Now is the time to change.

-Rudey

I would say that it depend on which part of the world you are talking about. I can say for Southeast Asia, despite this morning bombings, radical Islam is in yearly decline. Voting behaviour shows that radical Islamic party never had a good grasp of the Southeast Asian citizens. Malaysia saw PAS loosing votes because of its hardline Islamic platform. It even lost its strong hold province where it tried to introduce Sharia law. Then you have Indonesia where the radical Islamic parties gather no more then 13% of the total votes in the parlimentarian election. And this votes was shared between 6 parties, which made the faction a very weak faction. In fact, PPP realized that it can no longer run on the Islamic state platform and has instead changed itself. It changed from an exclusive Islamic party into an inclusive conservative party that has a nationalist platform.

So, it all depend on which locations. Some will see a rise in radical Islam, other will see a stagnation, and other a drop.

Just because you don't hear it in the media, it does not mean that there haven't any struggle against this movement. Just look at what the NU and Muhammadiyah has done to theologically combat radical Islam.

Uhm, they started fighting the minute they started putting "islam" along side "terrorism". Top religious leaders in this country, as well as Canada, have been speaking about this topic for ages now. No media interest I guess, maybe until now?

Sure they did.

-Rudey

You're talking about the government only though...but then again, I'm not sure what is going on outside of the government there.

Listen, when the heart of Islam is in the middle east (Mecca and all), it speaks a lot for Islam when that region moves towards extremism, funds radical wahabism, and so many terrorists come from there espousing those ideals.

-Rudey

The thing is that these guys were only local leaders. They have no real voice in Islam. They speak only to the religious people that directly follow them. Otherwise, they're pretty worthless. It seems only recently that Arab media outlets and traditional supporters of this nonsense have come to their senses. My only concern is that they are doing it at the insistance of the West. That's what it looks like to me at least.

I know that the outrage to many Muslims is genuine. In the past, however, I don't think it has been genuine enough. The Arab world as a whole is changing -- and changing fast.

And it's unfortunate, but this anti-terrorism sentiment is not universal. Last I checked, the Palestinians were still hanging pictures of the murderers of children and women in their streets to be thought of as heroes.

She made a claim and didn't back it up. Don't just swallow it up wholesale.

-Rudey

I guess I wasn't clear in my reply. The gist of my reply was that even if everything she said were true, she was only talking about a certain group of Muslims, not the whole of Islam.

As long as there is huge public support for terrorists anywhere in Islam and those people aren't shunned by the rest of the Islamic world (I'm talking about the Palestinians), any Muslim telling me that they don't support terrorism will be baseless in my opinion. Or at least limited to the opinion of one person and not society as a whole.

Believe it or not, Islam in the Southeast Asia is very very different then the middle east. In Indonesia in particular, people look toward the leaders of Muhammadiyah and NU for their spiritual guidence. And these two organizations have made it clear that Wahabinism will never be accepted by them. They have made it clear that the current state ideology, Pancasila, is the only ideology that is acceptable for Indonesia. This point of view is accepted not only by thw two organizations, but other faith based organizations in the country.

If you are wondering how much influence those two organization hold, they yiled very big influence. Politicians clamored to get their support, in which the two organizations has said that as a religious organization, they can not and will not meddle in political affairs. Almost all the academics and analyst have said that an Islamic state in Indonesia is, to the word of Prof. Harold Crouch, "unimaginable."

Saudi Arabia is the "home" of Islam. However, the ideology that is currently in Saudi Arabia has been rejected by most of the people in Indonesia and Southeast Asia in general. Some have accepted it, but they are in the minority. Like I said, you just have to look at the voting behaviour. If Wahabinism has gain a strong footing in the region, the radical Islamic parties would have garnered more votes. There was an interesting analysis that said that the reason JI is being more abresive with their bombings is because they are being ignored by the general public. I don;t know if its true or not, but it is certainly plausible.

ETA: NU has an estimated membership of over 40 millions, and Muhammadiyah has an estimated membership of over 20 millions.

What is the sentiment over suicide bombs? Do people try and make excuses for things by talking about these terrorists being freedom fighters or do they outright reject the violence?

And you're right, I still don't have that much of a grasp on Indonesia. But Saudi Arabia et al. is still very much the most influential - the brain of the body and Indonesia is but an arm and leg.

-Rudey

Suicide bombing is one that is being debated among the extremist, believe it or not. By all account, there are some that have accepted it, but overall, the majority of them do not accepted it.

Every Indonesian that I know of have outright reject the violance. Many have been calling for blood. Some wanted a legislation comparable to the ISA in MAlaysia and SIngapore. This is a dilema because of the past government's record on human rights violations. This is why Indonesia is seen by many analyst as a weak partner in the war on terrorism, the absence of an ISA. Most of the analysts don't understand the bloody and repressive history of the New Order.

Yes Indonesian Muslims have little influence outside of Southeast Asia. So is it fair to paint them in the same light as the terrorists, who has little support in the country? It seems that many like to paint Islam on one paint brush, thinking that it's one entity with one ideology and movement.

They are still one "body" though you know? I don't know how they can change things, but they can cut ties with terrorist nations and they can try and exert more influence on the religion.

-Rudey

The growth of radical Islam is only a concern in those nations that are economically disconnected from the modern world. Indonesia is connected, so it should not be a surprise that violent terrorism is not emerging from Indonesian Muslims.