Ahead of their execution last November, the three Bali bombers — Imam Samudra and brothers Amrozi and Mukhlas — issued a brazen threat: Anyone involved in their case faced their brethren’s militant wrath.
The warning extended from the judges who handled the bombers’ trials right up to the president himself. We saw the fruit of this over the weekend, when Indonesian police said they foiled a plot to attack a house owned by President Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono.
The head of state knows he is a target of the militants’ fury: He oversaw the execution of the three bombers; he adheres to the mainstream of Islam (as do the overwhelming majority of Muslim Indonesia); and he is market-oriented with an eye to the Western world, including firm relations with the United States and Britain.
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