Jay Solomon, Banyuwangi – Dariah didn't see who attacked her as she returned home last Sunday evening from the village mosque, nor does she know why her black-hooded assailants targeted her.

What the middle-aged woman feels certain of, though, is that if her neighbors hadn't chased off the men who were stabbing her neck and arm, she would have become a victim of an ominous series of killings sweeping through the poor villages of east Java. Now Mrs. Dariah, her deep, ruby-colored gashes untreated, lives in fear that the attackers will return.

Across this rice-farming region, only a 30-minute ferry ride from the swank tourist island of Bali, there is widespread terror. Bands of hooded men wielding swords and knives have killed or wounded hundreds of people in recent weeks. The reason for the killings is unclear, though it appears in part to be a brutal settling of scores by people whose lives have been upended and whose ability to feed themselves has been jeopardized by the economic and political chaos that has swept Indonesia this year.

Echoes of the past

The bloodletting, which even the authorities are struggling to understand, is one symptom of the breakdown in law and order in Indonesia since demonstrations and riots precipitated the resignation of longtime President Suharto in May. It is also frighteningly reminiscent of the massacre of as many as half a million Indonesians in the chaotic months surrounding the 1966 resignation of Indonesia's founding president, Sukarno.

Many of the hundreds estimated to have been killed in recent weeks have been members of Indonesia's largest Islamic organization, Nahdlatul Ulama. The group's leaders say they suspect a political drive to split the group and its political party ahead of next year's general elections.

But others here offer different explanations. Villagers say the victims have been people who are tukang santet – practitioners of black magic. The country's Armed Forces Commander, Gen. Wiranto, has says a resurgent Indonesian Communist Party, or PKI, is behind the murders. Local commanders in east Java blame vigilantism.

"There's no clear law on this sort of" retribution against people accused of black magic, says Banyuwangi police commander, Col. Budi Utomo. He says that when arrests have been made, truckloads of villagers have protested at police headquarters because "many support the killings" themselves.

As the authorities dither, the killings are spreading. They started in Banyuwangi and have spread to the neighboring districts of Jember, Pasuruan, Situbondo, and the island of Madura. Local media have even reported deaths in central and western Java in recent days. "How is it that there are all of these killings and no police?" asks Abdul Nasir, the vice secretary of Nahdlatul Ulama in Banyuwangi. "We have to make sure it stops."

'Ninja' killers

Villagers in these parts call the killers "ninjas," whose faces can't be seen and, like Mrs. Dariah's attackers, wear black. The lack of police presence in many villages has spurred people to set up their own security apparatus. Armed to the teeth with makeshift weapons – jagged-cut bamboo spears, rusty knives – virtually every man in a village here watches guard. "This time," says S. Haryono, a leader in Mrs. Dariah's village, "we're prepared for them."

The trouble may be distinguishing "them" from "us," for some villagers have blood on their own hands. Residents in Mrs. Dariah's village openly admit that just weeks before she was assaulted, a local mob attacked and killed a man named Roeslan, who was accused of being a tukang santet. Their proof? Village inhabitants said they suffered "bloated" bladders, after Mr. Roeslan had been accused of making sexual advances toward another villager's daughter.

In broad daylight, roughly 100 of the village's inhabitants attacked Mr. Roeslan as he walked home, stabbing him with scythes and bamboo poles, Mr. Haryono recalls. Who exactly were the murderers? People here simply say "the village." But Mr. Haryono himself makes no effort to conceal his presence at the killing and only laughs when asked why he failed to stop it. In an apparent effort to justify the murder, he guides a visitor to Mr. Roeslan's home, showing that his family remains in the village and that "there are no hard feelings."

In a neighboring village, the story is almost the same: two suspected tukang santet were killed late last month. One man was dragged to his death by motorcycles, while a mob attacked a 45- year-old man named Salam. The motive again stemmed from loose charges that the men were inflicting stomach ailments on the population. And as with Mr. Roeslan's death, these villagers have no sense of criminal wrongdoing.

Called from her hut to meet a reporter, Mr. Salam's widow, 35- year-old Usna, says she isn't interested in pressing charges. "Life is getting back to normal," she says. "I just want to let it be." More Chaos Is Feared

While the violence has nowhere near the intensity of the massacres in the 1960s, the danger that it could escalate is on many minds. "The atmosphere is the same. Everyone is now playing the game: If you don't like someone, you go after them," says Hermawan Sulistyo of the Indonesian Institute of Sciences.

The potential for greater mayhem clearly wasn't lost on Banyuwangi administrators when they met Tuesday to discuss what to do about the violence. The district's legislators harangued police commander Utomo for failing to bring the violence to an end. Col. Utomo responded that the violence was calming and that more "repressive" security measures would be taken.

The sense that darker forces were manipulating events, however, was also on the agenda. Some people believe the armed forces may have been involved. Police officials concede that some security personnel have been detained as part of a sweep; but military leaders deny that the military itself is instigating the violence. Col. Utomo stresses that the violence is being spurred, not by outside agitators, but by "old social beliefs that are not easy to undo."

Until these issues are cleared up, however, Banyuwangi will continue to live in fear. On a recent afternoon, the Islamic teacher Haji Ali Sudardji – an active member of Nahdlatul Ulama – sits in his small house worrying that the assailants will return. A week earlier, three black-clad men appeared at his school, carrying knives, and demanded that his students hand him over. They didn't, but he fears the men will return. "If they come, they come. There's not much I can do," he says. "But at least I can confront them."