On July 16, Indonesian authorities arrested a Palestinian activist named Abdul Karim Raed Miqdad. By the next morning he was on a plane to Cyprus. Human rights monitors now warn he could end up in Israeli custody.

Indonesia can probably point to paperwork that justifies each step along the way. None of it amounts to a moral defense. If Mr. Miqdad ends up in Israeli hands, Jakarta will have handed over a man who spent his life protesting Israeli policy to the very state that policy serves.

Indonesia usually presents itself as the largest Muslim-majority democracy on earth, a longtime supporter of the Palestinian cause, a country whose constitution rejects colonialism “in any form whatsoever.” That image took a hit this week.

Here is how the case unfolded. Mr. Miqdad was detained at the request of Interpol’s National Central Bureau in Nicosia, based on a Cyprus-issued Red Notice citing vague “terrorism-related offenses.” He was deported the next morning, before his family could really reach him and before a lawyer had much chance to help him. The Geneva Council for Rights and Liberties, which has tracked the case, says no one has explained what he is........

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