Haji Misbach

Haji Mohamad Misbach, commonly known as Haji Misbach or Haji Merah (Indonesian: The Red Hajji), Surakarta, 1876–1926, was an early communist figure from the Dutch East Indies who preached that Islam and Communism were compatible. He was a member of the Sarekat Islam (Islamic League) party in its early years. Along with Ernest Douwes Dekker and members of the Insulinde party, in 1918-19 he incited peasants in the Surakarta area to resist corvée duty and was arrested by the Dutch. With the 1923 split of the Sarekat Islam into left and right wings, he followed most of the left wing into the PKI (Indonesian Communist Party). After a bombing in Surakarta, Haji Misbach was blamed and exiled to New Guinea.