Indonesia’s largest Muslim group rebukes members for meeting with Israel’s president

Indonesia’s largest Muslim organization, Nahdlatul Ulama (NU), on Tuesday apologized for what it said was an unsanctioned meeting between some youth wing members and Israel’s president, which has angered many in the staunchly pro-Palestinian Southeast Asian nation. 

Indonesia does not have diplomatic relations with Israel and successive governments including the current administration of President Joko “Jokowi” Widodo have been vocal supporters of nationhood for the Palestinians.

NU Chairman Yahya Cholil Staquf said the Muslim organization’s leadership had no links to the early July meeting  at Israeli President Issac Herzog’s Tel Aviv residence, as Israel’s air and ground attacks on Gaza had entered the ninth month, having killed nearly 38,000 Palestinians.

“I apologize to the public that there were some individuals from Nahdlatul Ulama who recently went to Israel and engaged there,” Yahya Cholil told reporters.

A photograph posted July 7 on Instagram by an NU participant at the meeting, Zainul Maarif, which was geotagged  as having been taken on the same date in Tel Aviv, featured at least five people from the Southeast Asian country.

“Direct discussion with the president of Israel,” Zainul’s Instagram post said, highlighting the sentence with capital letters.

Zainul’s post also said: “Rather than demonstrating in the streets and boycotting, I choose to engage in discussion and share ideas.”

The post went viral on Indonesian social media, leading to a widespread public backlash including intense criticism from netizens, Muslim leaders and politicians.

Yahya said that the young leaders had traveled to the Jewish state at the invitation of an NGO there, which he claimed operates to burnish the image of the Israeli government.

NU spokesman Ishaq Zubaedi Raqib told BenarNews that the organization had established protocols for its members’ international engagements on strategic issues.

“All discussions must officially represent the NU board of leadership, particularly on sensitive matters such as those involving Gaza and Israel,” he said.

The Tel Aviv meeting was highly inappropriate, local media quoted Lukman Hakim Saiffudin, an MP from the National Awakening Party (PKB), as saying on Tuesday.

Meanwhile, Jokowi reaffirmed Indonesia’s position on the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, when asked by reporters about the controversy.

“Indonesia remains committed to a world order founded on independence, lasting peace and social justice,” he said.

Indonesian President-elect Prabowo Subianto, who is set to assume office in October, voiced support last month for Palestinian independence during a speech at an international conference in Jordan on the humanitarian crisis in Gaza.

He also offered to treat up to 1,000 Gazan patients in Indonesian hospitals and expressed his country’s readiness to send United Nations-mandated peacekeepers to Gaza.