On the Iraq front. Casualties are down. The insurgence continues. The press wants a civil war. The Iraq army and police get stronger . We prepare to draw down and pursue the terrorist to there next strong hold. That might be Iran.
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Indonesia
Islamic Indonesian council has hard line
Indonesia is a democratic, secular country, and there is no constitutional basis for using Islamic law in court in most regions. But insulting a religion is a crime, and a fatwa, or religious edict, issued by the Council of Ulemas can carry great weight as evidence of an alleged offense to Islam.
In recent months, fatwas issued by the Indonesian Council of Ulemas and its regional councils denouncing clerics and cults as deviant have been followed by arrests, prosecution and sometimes mob violence against the accused.
Sumardi Tappaya, 60, a high school religious teacher on the island of Sulawesi, was locked up in January after a relative told police he had heard Sumardi whistling while he prayed. The whistling was declared deviant by the local ulemas, and Sumardi is now in jail awaiting trial on charges of religious blasphemy. He faces five years in prison.
Ardhi Husain, 50, who ran an Islamic center in East Java that treated drug addiction and cancer with traditional medicine and prayer, was sentenced in September to five years in prison for writing a book that the ulemas said contained 70 errors, such as claiming that Muhammad was not the last prophet and that non-Muslims could go to heaven. Five editors of the book also received five-year terms. An employee who sold a copy to a neighbor received three years.
After Husain's arrest, a mob burned down his facility. No one has been arrested in the attack
Fighting between Muslims and Christians has claimed thousands of lives in Indonesia in recent years, while Islamic suicide bombers have staged high-profile attacks in Bali and Jakarta that have killed hundreds. Less visible has been the effort by conservative Muslims to compel other members of their own faith to hew to a more traditional line.
Ma'ruf Amin, a vice chairman of the Indonesian Council of Ulemas and the chairman of its fatwa committee, says the ulemas' role is to define proper behavior for Muslims and to set boundaries that protect the purity of Islam.
He denies that the ulemas are promoting hatred, and he blames Muslims who engage in deviant practices for bringing violence upon themselves.
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Algeria - From The Weekend Australian
| This story is from our news.com.au network | Source: AFP |
March 26, 2006
ALGERIAN militants killed five civilians, including a mayor, stepping up attacks days after the start of an amnesty for rebels aimed at ending more than a decade of strife, residents and newspapers said overnight.
Suspected members of al Qaeda-linked group the Salafist Group for Preaching and Combat (GSPC) shot dead mayor Brahim Jellab outside his house on Friday night in Boumerdes province, 50 km east of the capital Algiers, residents said.
GSPC is the only armed group operating in Boumerdes and the neighbouring province of Tizi Ouzou, Interior Minister Noureddine Zerhouni said last week.
Mr Jellab is the fifth mayor to be assassinated by Islamist gunmen in Bourmedes in the past four years, residents said.
Algeria began an amnesty this month as part of efforts to end violence that broke out when the authorities cancelled elections in 1992 that a now-banned Islamic party was poised to win. An estimated 200,000 people have been killed since then.
The peace drive includes the mass release of jailed Islamic militants as well as compensation for victims, including the families of about 8,000 missing people.
The amnesty gave those rebels still fighting six months to surrender, provided they were not involved in massacres, rapes or bombings of public places.
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