3. Pemalang
The Pemalang katibah includes the city of Pekalongan, which featured prominently in Bali II planning. Noordin drew in some Pekalongan-based JI members but the area has otherwise not featured prominently in JIs development. One well-known Pekalongan resident, Said Sungkar, appears regularly on the fringes of the organisations activity, although he is not believed to be a member. He is known as the king of honey, which he reportedly supplies to the fast-growing business of Islamic medicine in which many JI members are involved.
B. SOLO/SURAKARTA
The Solo wakalah is by all accounts JIs largest, but there is surprisingly little information on its structure. It is where JIs headquarters were based from 1999 until at least late 2002, and most of the organisations best-known schools are in its territory, including Pesantren al-Mukmin (Pondok Ngruki) in Ngruki, Sukoharjo, founded by Abu Bakar Baasyir; Darusy-Syahada in Boyolali; Ulil al-Bab in Karanganyar; Isykarima in Tawangmangu; and Mahad Aly, also known as Universitas an-Nur in Solo city. The wakalah was led in 2002-2004 by Ichsan Miarso, head of al-Alaq publishing, which produces some of JIs key texts, such as the twelve-volume set of Abdullah Azzams writings. It is not clear who succeeded him.
The wakalah reportedly includes a katibah in the districts of Solo, Sukoharjo, Klaten, Boyolali, Sragen and Wonogiri. Though the wakalah also covers Yogyakarta, where the Indonesian Mujahidin Council is based, JI has never been particularly strong there, perhaps because it was where the salafi movement was based, represented by Jafar Umar Thalib, one of JIs bitterest opponents.
The schools in the Solo area mean that new members are constantly being added, especially with many second-generation JI members now enrolled. Some of JIs top leaders are associated with these schools. In addition to Abu Bakar Baasyir, they include his sons, Abdul Rohim and Rosyid; Abdul Rohim alias Abu Husna, the younger brother of former Mantiqi II head Abdullah Anshori alias Abu Fatih, who teaches at Mahad Aly; and Afif Abdul Majid and Mustakim alias Muzayin Atik, two other Ngruki teachers. Zulkarnaen, the near-mythical head of JI military operations, has probably been based in or around Solo for much of the past five years.
Solo appears to be a hub of economic activity as well. The Association of Islamic Publishers (Serikat Penerbit Islam, SPI) brings together at least five publishing houses with links to JI, including al-Alaq and Jazera Press, which published Imam Samudras best-seller, Aku Melawan Teroris [I Fight Terrorists]. The publishing houses have a tie-in to Islamic medicine; the outlets that sell the books often market the medicine, mostly herbal capsules and honey-based products. At least one small garment factory also adds to the organisations income.
Despite the arrests in late March 2007 of key members of a Sukoharjo cell, the release of several top members of the Solo wakalah earlier in the year are likely to aid consolidation efforts. They include Herlambang, a man who worked closely with Zulkarnaen; Lutfi Hudaeroh alias Ubeid, who served as Noordin Moh. Tops courier prior to the Australian embassy bombing; and a close associate of Ubeids named Bagus Budi Pranoto alias Urwah who was originally from Kudus and who is described as a preacher in the 1999 document from the Central Java wakalah. Ubeids brother runs an SPI publishing house, with an office across the street from Pondok Ngruki.
If it is true that Solo is the largest wakalah, exceeding East Java and Lampung, a membership of over 300 is not unthinkable; some ex-JI members put the number far higher.
C. EAST JAVA
East Java is said to be the third largest wakalah. Cholily, an East Java JI member arrested for helping prepare the Bali II bombs, notes that in 2000 a meeting of the wakalah in Surabaya was attended by about 100, meaning total membership was certainly larger. As late as 2005, the wakalah was divided into six qirdas: Malang, Surabaya, Sidoarjo, Tulungagung, Lamongan and Magetan. It had its own charitable foundation, Yayasan Abnaul Ummah, and several members ran businesses that seemed to contribute to the organisations financial support, such as a headscarf factory. As long as Usman bin Sef alias Fahim, its head through 2004, was in charge, the wakalah could be counted on to support Noordin Tops program, and parts of it likely still constitute a support base. Fahim was arrested in June 2004, accused of hiding Noordin, sentenced to three years in prison and released in late 2006.
1. Surabaya
In Surabaya, from at least 1997, JI activities were centred around the Darussalam Institute where Fahim and his successor, Son Hadi, were based, but several Surabaya mosques, notably al-Ikhsan, also hosted regular JI pengajians, suggesting the presence of more than one cell. Fahim also ran the charitable foundation Abnaul Ummah, where a few JI members worked. The ease and efficiency with which the wakalah heads have been replaced since Fahims arrest attest to an institutional depth sufficient to overcome arrests and/or defections of members and permit a degree of regeneration. But each successive head has been less experienced than his precedessor, suggesting that the number that can be called on to fill vacancies is dwindling.
2. Malang
The story of JIs Malang base suggests current weakness but also an ability to bounce back. Malang is a university town, and many of the recruits were students who left there when they graduated. One of those involved in the Bali II plot, Abdul Aziz alias Jafar, began attending a JI pengajian with five others in 1994, when he was a student at the National Technical Institute (ITN) in Malang. After a year, the leader of the group invited him to Surabaya, where he was inducted into JI by Fahim. He then took part in a short training course (dauroh) after which he was told that he was now a murobbi (religious instructor) and should return to Malang to start his own pengajian group. In 1997, before he had graduated, he returned to his home town of Pekalongan, Central Java and eventually joined a JI pengajian there.
In 1997, just as Abdul Aziz was getting ready to leave Malang, another student, Cholily, began taking part in a pengajian at the state teacher training college there. Two years later, he and four others, three of them students at Brawijaya University in Malang, were inducted into JI, also by Fahim. The group constituted a fiah (cell) and reported to Abdul Rozak, head of the qirdas, the next level up in the hierarchy. Cholily, who also took part in the planning for Bali II, was arrested in November 2005. He said during his interrogation that the three Brawijaya students moved away after they graduated in 2000 or 2001, and Abdul Rozak left town after the Australian embassy bombing in September 2004, leaving Cholily as the only JI member in Malang.
But this is highly unlikely. He may not have known about other cells but there were probably at least two or three others. Abdul Aziz refers to Ahmad alias Abu Hadid, and Fahi Himawan as the head and secretary of the Malang katibah, and Cholily mentions Abdul Rozak as the head of the Malang qirdas. JI would be unlikely to have a katibah structure with only one qirdas, which in turn had only one fiah. The real figure in Malang may have been closer to ten, but it is also possible that Cholilys arrest put a temporary halt to activities.
In trying to assess JIs current strength in East Java, one consideration is the extent to which recruiting continues in Malangs colleges and universities. It was clearly productive in the past but aggressive campus recruiting by PKS and Hizb ut-Tahrir may have diminished the scope for JI, which has never had very much success in the university community outside Solo and Malang.
Terrorism
