The Jakarta Post | Editorial
Following yet another attack on the Ahmadiyah minority on Sunday, what will President Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono do? From experience — nothing.

Nothing significant enough to stop the growing list of incidents of intimidation and violence against minorities hoping to live in peace in a nation that prides itself on its Pancasila ideology.

As in previous reports, police officers at the scene in Tenjowaringin village, Tasikmalaya regency, West Java, did nothing to stop the rampage. Ahmadiyah spokesman Dodi Kurniawan posited that the attacks were linked to a meeting of the local branch of the Indonesian Ahmadiyah Congregation (JAI) on Friday and Saturday, which was attended by some 2,700 villagers. A small mosque and an elementary school were among 29 buildings damaged in the incident.
On the same day former first lady Sinta Nuriyah Wahid visited Ahmadiyah followers in Bekasi, also in West Java, who have stayed in their mosque that was sealed by the municipality on April 4.

A man inspects an Ahmadiyah mosque damaged in an attack by hard-line Islamists in Singaparna, Tasikmalaya, West Java on Monday, May 6, 2013.

In Tasikmalaya, as in other places where incidents like these have taken place, the authorities resort to laws and regulations that place minorities on the defensive. The predicted pattern nowadays is that authorities condemn violence though police take no action and then justify it by referring to national and local rules.

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