Ten Dead, 120 Injured in Manila Mall Bombing
I’ve been remiss in not commenting on Friday’s bombing at the Glorietta Shopping Mall in the Philippines. It’s an attack so awful even other terrorists don’t want to be associated with it:
Norberto Gonzales, the president’s security adviser, said they had received an intelligence report that Abu Sayyaf was trying to raise funds abroad using the internet site YouTube and the blast could be used as part of this campaign.
“What is more ominous here is they may be planning a bigger attack,” Gonzales said on a radio programme on Saturday.
“They will first show a sample. That means that while the bomb yesterday already was powerful, it is still just a sample.”
However, speaking on local radio on Saturday, Abu Sayyaf denied that they were involved in the explosion.
The Moro Islamic Liberation Front, another Muslim separatist group, also said they were unaware of the blast.
Problem is, the bomb was a pretty sophisticated one, and the group that has claimed responsibility doesn’t seem capable of pulling this off:
Meanwhile, the Anti-Terrorism Task Force (ATTF) doubted that the Rajah Solaiman Group could fulfill its threat to pull off another bombing in Metro Manila. The group earlier claimed responsibility for the Glorietta blast.
ATTF head Ricardo Blancaflor said they cannot accept at face value the claim of one Sheik Omar claiming responsibility for the incident that killed 10 people, and hurt at least 113 others.
Still, Blancaflor said they are now verifying and double-checking their data to see if the group indeed has the capability to conduct attacks.
They’re a charming bunch. Notice how they’re a bit more specific than is usual about the religion they’re targeting:
Also in a text message to ABS-CBN News, the person who said he was RSM spokesman Ruben Omar Lavilla, alias Sheik Omar, demanded the release of founder Hilarion del Rosario Santos, alias Ahmed Islam Santos, within 24 hours or the group will launch a similar attack targeting public places and vital installations.
“Jihad (holy war) against the Christians will continue if the military will not stop the killings of Muslims in Mindanao and Ahmed Santos should be released within 24 hours, otherwise, (Christians will) suffer again the consequences,” the caller said.
Del Rosario, captured in October 2006 at a hideout in Zamboanga City in southern Philippines, was the head of the RSM, a group of Christians who converted to Islam and suspected to have links with the Abu Sayyaf and Jemaah Islamiyah.
The RSM is an organization of Filipinos who have converted to Islam, was suspected of carrying out the Rizal Day bombing in 2000 and the February 2004 bombing of a Super Ferry ship that killed 116 people on Manila Bay. The group was also implicated in plots to attack the US Embassy in the Philippines.
More on the official skepticism here. Whether or not RSM could handle it, Jemaah Islamiyah could handle it quite well. They were behind the Bali Bombing–and they even (allegedly) had a little helper in Silicon Valley.
MORE: Interested in learning more about jihad in the Philippines? Bryan at Hot Air recommends you set your TiVo today for a worthwhile History Channel documentary narrated by Mark “Black Hawk Down” Bowden.
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ROP?
And I still get crap about the Crusades (for the record, I’m against them).
This is so sad and pointless. Why do they insist on destroying? What good do they think it is doing? What demands are getting met? I don’t understand these people who just want to kill and destroy. What is wrong with these people?
Again I’d remind everyone, this is an act by the minority. Plenty of muslims are completely find with the “live and let live” theory on life.
They just aren’t the ones who make the news, because they aren’t the ones blowing crap up.
Damn those 72 virgins.
While it may have a measure of truth to it, that meme is getting a little stale. Are you suggesting we just allow it to happen because “the majority of Muslims are peaceful, blah, blah, blah…?”
Muslims MUST demand a reformation of their religious community to live in peace with other non-Muslims. There has to be a backlash to show this is unacceptable behavior. Otherwise, you are implicitly condoning such behavior. I have no problem with making it a “You are either with us or against us” moment.
My question to you swj is how many innocents are you willing to sacrifice before you draw the line in the sand?
For the record, I have no religious affiliation but have no problem with anyone practicing whatever religion as long as it does not intrude on my right to abstain.
If only the Phillipine Army would get out of Iraq, everyone would be friends.
hadsil,
You, are one insightful person!
The Philippines have had nothing but trouble with the “Religion of Pieces” population for decades. This unfortunate loss of life will only result in sending more troops into the jungles of the southern islands to hunt down every last Jihadist in the country. The Philippino’s are a wonderful friendly people it is terrible what Muslims do. I am only surprised by the few days in the calendar when I do not hear of a similar attack or threats from some lunatic cleric wanting to kill all of us infidels. I guess I visit Little Green Footballs and Jihad Watch too often. The only thing wrong with these people is they believe their religion should be spread by the sword as written down in their text book of conquest. I can’t think of any other religion in the world preaching this method of finding converts they all seem to have evolved away from violence except for this one religion. My prayers to the families of the dead and injured. I will not submit!
for the record, I’m for the Crusades. The Crusades were only an effort to retake the Christian holy lands from the muslim conquerers.
Boomer, It’s hard to get these people when our can of whoop a$$ is only half way open.We need to get the lid off and get serious about the situation.
Listening to FOX this morn and things are heating up with the Turks and the Kurd rebels.
There goes that pesky bumper sticker thing again.
I saw the film on radical Islam on Fox last night ,you know the one that tax payer funded NPR tried to quash, and it is a must see. Fox needs to run it all week on prime time if they can.
That’s just it, there IS no understanding these people. Evil is evil.
This is true, if you go by the numbers, ie 1 billion muslims, a few bad apples, blah blah blah. But where’s the majority condemning this? I don’t know if you’re aware, but this happened inside a SHOPPING MALL in the business center of Manila.
Full disclosure: my brother’s girlfriend was at this mall when this happened. She was in the missing persons list for about 24 hours. Thank God she’s alive, but she has leg injuries. Her friend was not so lucky. She watched her friend get blown up right in front of her.
It really amazes me how some people are so utterly clueless about terrorism. I’m talking about the peaceniks. A lot of these people probably think that there was no terrorism before 9-11, or even the USS cole bombing. These are the [mostly stupid and/or undereducated] people that are going to get us killed.
I remember back in the mid 80’s we lost a Pave Low near Zamboanga in an operation supporting the Philippine army.
The war on jihad must be won.
More demands and threats. Not even an attempt to be a “religion of peace”. This is war to them, and so it should be war to us, as well. Luckily, there are American Special Forces in the Phillipines working with the Fillipino military and federal police, training and advising on counter-terrorist operations. Col. Ollie North did a live report with the American commander and his Fillipino counterpart on H&C a few months back.
Since this war is just a bumper sticker, we should do what Code Pink says and “PULL…OUT…NOWWWW!!!!”
What happened to my comment (posted 10:54 am)? I can see it as comment #14 when I’m logged in, but not when I’m logged off. Strange.
Yeah, Pull out bigger guns.
GRRRRRR… If they would leave innocent people alone, and just kill each other, we would be rid of jihadis in a week or two.
The Filipinos don’t deserve those murdering swine. I hope Arroyo will slam ASG with the sword of vengence.
JHSII
The Crusades may have started out as a noble cause of protecting pilgrims and other Christians but it soon degraded into a “less than Christian” rule of the Holy Land and then into a number of poorly planned and executed failed campaigns whose real goal was glory and gold.
They sacked Christian Constantanople for goodness sake.
And the whole idea of a Christian “Holy War” pretty much flies in the face of everything Christian.
The 1st time I traveled to the Philippines was in Oct 2004.We stayed in Makati very close to the Glorietta Mall. My wife and I walked over to the mall and shopped there….. The security is just alittle bit different than the typical security here in the USA.
This was during a time of heightened alert in the Philippines.When we went to enter into the mall we were segregated into seperate male and female entrances. Armed male guards ran a wand over me , and I had to pass a bomb sniffing dogs inspection . My wife received the same only by a female armed guard and she also had her purse and shopping bag searched…… This was just to enter the mall.We had to do this all over again just to exit the mall.
The banks that I saw had at least two armed guards posted by the entrance.One with an M-16 and another with a shotgun.Lord knows what was also there inside.The local money exchangers had basically the same sort of personnel.
The airport security is much tighter than we have here.
When I was in Northern Mindinao last summer visiting my wifes relatives it wasnt quite as strong security wise but the presence of Pascorp , police and military was ever present.
It’s a different mindset over there.Despite the poverity they do try hard to keep their country…. Despite the best efforts of the chinese communists and several Jihadist groups.The Filipinos have been fighting them for over 100 years now.The middle east was not the USA’s 1st fighting with Radical Islam….. Just ask General Black Jack Pershing about his exploits with the Moro’s in the Philippines a century ago.
But you can bet the liberals would have a caniption fit if the USA ever tried to get serious about security.
Dispite this we will also be returning to the Philippines for visits in the future.The ” Religion Of Peace ” has not made the Philippines submit … nor are they likely to.Jesus Christ is very much in the hearts of the vast majority of the filipinos.
“The Filipinos don’t deserve those murdering swine. I hope Arroyo will slam ASG with the sword of vengence.”
Agreed.
BTW,
Anyone have any idea how to get ahold of the book, “Global Jihad:The Future in the Face of Militant Islam” by Patrick Sookhdeo (discussed at Atlas Shrugs)?
I can’t find it at Addall books, allbookstores.com, Amazon, Half.com, bookfinder.com, chambal.com, nor Barnes&Noble.
Hell, this is even tougher to find than “Alms for Jihad” was.
Bornin58,
I was in that mall winter of ‘06 and do not recall anything more than a pat-down, but there was no alerts as you describe.
I do not recall any security in the Ayala Center in Cebu City, but every Mall in Manila had at least a cursory search.
I also recall from my first visit every bank having armed guards at each and every entrance.
The absolutely only “bright side” to this (yet more Islamic carnage) is that the more the Islamists continue to do this all over the world, the more the world will begin to open its eyes to the very real and present threat of Islam and Jihad. The world can only keep its blinders on but for so much longer. As it stands there are still people (like a lot of my friends, co-workers and aquaintences) who insist that these violent activities are just perpetrated by “fringe groups” and that the conservatives are “over-reacting” and that “most Muslims are moderate and peaceful”. First of all people who think like this are IGNORANT of the facts. Second of all the flip side to the Islamic coin of violence is that you never (or if ever, then extremely rarely) hear these so-called peaceful and moderate Muslims speaking out against violent Jihad. No, never. They are just silent, letting the world think they are “peaceful”. Personally I believe that if push ever comes to shove the moderate Muslims will side with the violent ones. Muslims stick together. Many of them are likely celebrating these attacks in private and applauding the Jihadists for a job well done–behind closed doors of course.
This religion came straight from the devil and the gates of hell. There is nothing but evil of this religion that the devil uses to deceive millions. The devil is called the father of lies and has perpetuated this religion only to fool and deceive millions from the real Truth. Sorry for sounding preachy but someone has to say what Islam really is. Also the so called moderates are always so silent on these carnages that just happened in Manilla.
I am an American living here in Makati… my office is a few blocks from the Glorietta Mall. I can’t speak to the details better than Michelle, but I can speak to the effect of such terrorst acts on the folks here…
…nothing…
The folks are just carrying on with their lives. The Mall was still open on Friday night and over the weekend.
I had a management meeting with my team here this morning and asked them about it. There is no hand wringing, no fear, no changing habits or plans. Just carrying on as usual, which is exactly what they should be doing
granite, this book hasn’t been released in the US yet. Mid-November it should be available.
From the Manila Times:
Police: Glorietta blast could be accidental
WAS it a bomb or gas explosion? That question may finally be answered when the Philippine National Police reveals today its findings on the deadly blast that rocked the Glorietta 2 mall last Friday.
Meanwhile, Sen. Antonio F. Trillanes IV, maintained that government is behind Friday’s deadly blast that left 11 dead and at least 100 injured.
National Capital Region Police Office chief Geary Barias said on Monday that the investigation of the blast is still ongoing and results would be released within 24 hours.
“We are not discounting anything . . . we are looking at many different angles including the bomb angle, accidental explosion and even claim of the Rajah Solaiman Movement that it is their handiwork,” Barias added.
It was only last Sunday that investigators reached the basement of the shopping center, or two days after rubble on the path leading to the basement was cleared. It is believed the explosion came from the basement, where there is a tank that can hold 3,500 liters of fuel (bunker or diesel).
Barias said no bomb components such as timing devices and batteries were recovered from the debris, apart from RDX, a component of C-4 or plastic explosive.
http://www.manilatimes.net/national/2007/oct/23/yehey/top_stories/20071023top3.html
So it turns out that this explosion was “likely accidental:”
http://www.manilatimes.net/national/2007/oct/24/yehey/top_stories/20071024top5.html
Yet some of you here wanted to presume guilt upon the Muslims by saying “I hope Arroyo will slam ASG with the sword of vengence.” – “Yeah, Pull out bigger guns.” “It really amazes me how some people are so utterly clueless about terrorism.” “I’m for the Crusades” and finally, “There has to be a backlash to show this is unacceptable behavior.”
Talk about your Popular Delusions and the Madness of Crowds…
The responses above sound more like the African Americans who wanted to convict the Duke Lacrosse players before they even had a trial.
I guess Fox News propoganda is working fine. Granny get your gun! There’s Muslims in them there hills!
And the results are in….
no bomb…but by all means, keep jumping to conclusions…Islamofacism seems to be the Republican party mantra these days…but never an attack on Saudi Arabia where the worst radicals, the Wahhibi’s hail from and 14 out of 19 hijackers on 9/11 came from. Why? Think for yourselves people. There’s much more to this than some radical Muslims.
Again, no bomb…just hysteria…
http://www.inquirer.net/specialfeatures/gloriettablast/view.php?db=1&article=20071123-102629