Introduction
The nightclub bombings of Bali, Indonesia took place on October 22, 2002, and killed 202 people, injuring over 200 others, most of whom were tourists from Australia (Fischer, 2006). The terrorist group responsible for the attacks was Jemaah Islamiyah, which is an Islamist extremist group operating in South Asia but is affiliated with al-Qaeda (Fischer, 2006). The Indonesian government arrested, tried, convicted, and subsequently executed three of the group’s members for the attacks namely Huda bin Abdul Haq, Amrozi Nurhasyim, and Imam Samudra (Muchransyah, 2016). The first bomb (suicide bomb) exploded at 11:05 pm at a nightclub called Paddy’s Bar, which was a local place that foreigners frequented, most of whom were Australian young people (Ambrosio De Nelson, 2004). It led to the evacuation of the club into the street, but after a few seconds, a car bomb, which authorities classified as powerful, exploded near a nightclub called Sari Club, which was a few meters from Paddy’s Bar (Ambrosio De Nelson, 2004). The third bomb exploded at the front of the consulate of the United States in the island but did not kill or injure any person. Figures showed that 88 Australians, 38 Indonesians, and 28 British nationals died from the attacks (Ambrosio De Nelson, 2004). Other 21 victims were of different nationalities, and after a week, the Indonesian police arrested ten suspects out of the 30 that it believed were responsible for the fatal attacks (Ambrosio De Nelson, 2004).
Many agencies took place in the investigations of the tragedy, including Indonesian police, assisted by both British and Australian taskforces. The law enforcement agencies concluded that Jemaah Islamiyah was the terrorist group responsible for the attacks and the group carried past attacks in different countries, including Indonesia. The Indonesian government linked the group to al-Qaeda, an international terrorist group that Osama bin Laden found. A week before the attacks, the Indonesian law enforcement arrested the Islamic cleric, Abu Bakar Bashir, who was the spiritual leader of the terrorist group and one of its founders (Fischer, 2006). The police connected him to many attacks that took place in the past before the October 22 bombings. Following investigations, the police arrested Imam Samudra, who was the primary planner of the attacks. Others that were later arrested included Ali Ghufron, and his two brothers, Amrozi Nurhasyim and Ali Imron, who all confessed to having taken part in the attacks. During his sentencing, Abu Bakar Bashir stated that it was his Islamic duty to fight “infidels” (Fischer, 2006).
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Background of the Attack
History of the Geographic Region
Bali is one of the locations in Southeast Asia where al-Qaeda developed grave interest. In June of 2002, a key leader of the al-Qaeda, Omar al-Farouq, was arrested in Indonesia, at Java and interrogation on him and his activities revealed that Jemaah Islamiyah was planning a joint attack with al-Qaeda on a large scale against Western countries in the region to coincide with the first anniversary of the September 11, 2001, terrorist attacks that took place in the United States (Fischer, 2006). Therefore, one of the historical events that led to the attacks was the 9/11 attacks, but it is important to note that Bali became a target because the terrorist group could not find hard targets like embassies due to many barriers (Fischer, 2006). It was a soft target because of the low population.
Investigations revealed that the initial targets were ExxonMobil installations and Dumai, but due to the logistics and the difficulties of attacking them, the terrorists settled on Bali because of the limited security that it had and its popularity as a tourist destination, especially among Americans and Australians. Relatively, the possible collateral damage was minimal because of the low population of Muslims, being that Hindu is the primary religion in the island. Southeast Asia was the second frontier for terrorist activities led by al-Qaeda and Bali became a location of interest for terrorist organizations, especially al-Qaeda. In his address, Osama bin Laden stated that the group had interests in the Philippines, Indonesia, Thailand, and Malaysia because of their affiliation with Western powers. Eventually, Bali became a host for several terrorist activities because of the many home-grown terrorist groups, facilitated by weak governance, failed societies, porous borders, and the Muslim population (Muchransyah, 2016).
Historical Events
The most important historical event that led to the terrorist attack was the election of President Megawati Sukarnoputri and his deputy, Hamzah Haz. The vice president of Indonesia, Hamzah Haz was a supporter of Islamist militants during his time at the helm of the nation’s leadership. His party, the United Development Party (PPP) was a Muslim majority party, and before the occurrence of the 2002 bombings, he became the vice president of the Southeast Asian nation, and publicly supported Abu Bakar Bashir (Ambrosio De Nelson, 2004). In one of his speeches, he stated that he was very close to the terrorist and spiritual leader of the al-Qaeda and its affiliate group, Jemaah Islamiyah. A week before the bombings, he stated publicly that if the Indonesian government wanted to arrest Abu Bakar Bashir, then it had to arrest him first.
He publically invited the terrorist lord to dinner, kissed his cheek, and stated that besides the spiritual leader, he was also very close to Jamar Umar Thalib, who is the head of the Laskar Jihad (Ambrosio De Nelson, 2004). Laskar Jihad is a terrorist and paramilitary group that was responsible for the killing of thousands of Christians between 1999 and 2001 in Maluku, a province in Indonesia (Ambrosio De Nelson, 2004). According to research findings by Muchransyah (2016), the growth of Jamaah Islamiyah took many decades in Indonesia, and with the support that it got from al-Qaeda, it grew substantially. It began to develop before Hamzah Haz became vice president. It infiltrated the Indonesian military from 1979 with Fazul Hasbi playing a key role in its development when he became a mole for the Indonesian government but also remained the leader of the terrorist group for many years, gaining trust in the government and gradually building the group. He had a long association with the Indonesian military, and he played a major role in the 2002 bombings (Muchransyah, 2016).
The Terrorist Organization
Jamaa Islamiyah (JI) is an Islamist terrorist group that is significantly active in many parts of the Southeast Asian region and has the primary aim of establishing a pan-Islamic state throughout the region’s countries (Fischer, 2006). In Arabic, the name stands for Islamic Organization and the group is responsible for carrying out attacks against the United States and other Western powers including Australia and Britain in many parts of the Philippines, Singapore, and Indonesia. One of its most important attacks remains the 2002 Bali Nightclub Bombings. The Indonesian government believes that the most recent attacks by the terrorists were on October 1, 2005, after a series of suicide bombings killed twenty people and wounded 129 others in Bali (Muchransyah, 2016).
The Indonesian government stated that it believes that the group was formed in the late 1960s with the primary objective of propagating fundamentalist Muslim precepts not only in the country, but also in the Philippines, Malaysia, Singapore, and Thailand (Muchransyah, 2016). Although it has affiliations with al-Qaeda, its roots lie in Darul Islam which is a radical and violent Islamic movement that advocates for the establishment of Islamic law in the Southeast Asian region (Ambrosio De Nelson, 2004). Since Indonesia is the most Muslim-populous country in the world and home to people of diverse faiths such as Christians and Hindus, and other adherents, the group primarily focuses on it. Darul Islam emerged in the late 1940s to resist the colonial rule of the Dutch, but its followers continued to resist the postcolonial republic in Indonesia because it considered it as secular (Ambrosio De Nelson, 2004). After the formation of JI, it resisted violence but shifted its tactics in the late 1990s because of its affiliation to al-Qaeda (Ambrosio De Nelson, 2004).
- Ambrosio De Nelson, S. (2004). Southeast Asian Press Coverage of Terrorism and the Bali Bombing. The Copenhagen Journal Of Asian Studies, 20(2004), 47. doi: 10.22439/cjas.v20i0.32
- Fischer, C. (2006). Remembering Bali as Paradise: The Bombing of Kuta and the Recovery of the Balinese Tourist Identity. Journeys, 7(2), 1-6. doi: 10.3167/jys.2006.070207
- Muchransyah, A. (2016). The Framing of the 2002 Bali Bombing in the Media: “Long Road to Heaven” and National Geographic’s “Seconds from Disaster”: “The Bali Bombing (Disco Bombing)”. The International Journal Of Interdisciplinary Studies In Communication, 11(1), 1-14. doi: 10.18848/2324-7320/cgp/v11i01/1-14
