Hard-line strain of Islam gains ground in Indonesia. 100,000 attend rally against Christian governor of Jakarta

The biggest street protest in years shook this sprawling capital on Friday in a stark display of the more conservative, militant strain of Islam taking hold in the world’s largest Muslim country, Indonesia.
Police said an estimated 100,000 people turned out for a rally called by hard-line Muslim groups against the capital’s Christian governor, whom
they accuse of having committed blasphemy.
Turnout was lower than some organizers had predicted, after the nation’s largest Muslim organizations this week discouraged their members from attending.
President Joko Widodo had met with other political leaders amid calls for calm, but critics say he has been too slow since taking office in 2014 to respond to worsening tension for fear of being labeled anti-Muslim.
In a recent interview, Mr. Widodo said religious and political leaders had a responsibility to “cool temperatures down,” and he vowed to protect minorities.
“We are one of the most tolerant countries in the world,’’ Mr. Widodo told The Wall Street Journal. “My government won't tolerate any discrimination.”
The Jakarta governor’s election in February is building into a test.
“Religiosity is rising, especially among the middle class,” said Yon Machmudi, an Islamic politics expert at the University of Indonesia. “A sense of identification is increasing.’’
Protesters were taking aim at Basuki Tjahaha Purnama, known as Ahok, who is the most prominent politician among the country’s often-persecuted, ethnic Chinese minority. He was elected deputy governor in 2012 and elevated to the top job in 2014 after his boss, Mr. Widodo, was elected president.
Some hard-liners had tried to block his ascent then, saying Muslims shouldn’t be ruled by a “kafir,” or nonbeliever.
The blunt-spoken Mr. Purnama, 50 years old, also has irritated many with a brash, get-things-done manner that has conflicts with Javanese traditions of polite compromise.
Mr. Purnama, now running for re-election, angered the groups again by citing a verse of the Quran in a public address in late September. He has apologized and said he would cooperate with a police investigation, but has since been the target of protests. Nearly 90% of Indonesia’s 250 million people are Muslim.
The Southeast Asian nation—some 18,000 islands straddling the Pacific and Indian oceans—has a long tradition of moderate Islam in a culture influenced earlier by Hinduism and Buddhism.