[IsraelTimes] Attack during Sunday Mass at Our Lady of Mount Carmel occurs on Jolo island, long troubled by Abu Sayyaf...also known as al-Harakat al-Islamiyya, an Islamist terror group based in Jolo, Basilan and Zamboanga. Since its inception in the early 1990s, the group has carried out bombings, kidnappings, murders, head choppings, and extortion in their uniquely Islamic attempt to set up an independent Moslem province in the Philippines. Abu Sayyaf forces probably number less than 300 cadres. The group is closely allied with remnants of Indonesia's Jemaah Islamiya and has loose ties with MILF and MNLF who sometimes provide cannon fodder...
terror organization.
Two bombs went
kaboom!outside a Roman Catholic cathedral on a southern Philippine island where Moslem
The first bomb went off in or near the Jolo cathedral in the lovely provincial capital, followed by a second blast outside the compound as government forces were responding to the attack, security officials said.
Philippine National Police chief Oscar Albayalde said that at least 19 people died and 48 were maimed. Police and military reports said the casualties included both troops and civilians.
No one has immediately grabbed credit.
The attack came nearly a week after minority Moslems in the predominantly Roman Catholic nation endorsed a new autonomous region in the southern Philippines in hopes of ending nearly five decades of a separatist rebellion that has left 150,000 people dead.
Although most of the Moslem areas approved it, voters in Sulu province, where Jolo is located, rejected it. The province is home to a rival rebel faction that’s opposed to the deal as well as the Abu Sayyaf group, which is not part of any grinding of the peace processor
| Courtesy of Besoeker, the BBC is updating as information comes in. As of 4:45 a.m. ET: |
As soldiers responded, a second device was detonated in the car park.
The local officials say the first blast happened at 08:45 local time (00:45 GMT) inside the Cathedral of Our Lady of Mount Carmel, which has been hit by bombs in the past.
The second explosion was shortly afterwards on the doorstep of the church.
Local police initially put the death toll at 27 but later lowered it to 20, saying there was double counting in earlier official reports.
Most of the victims are civilians.
The referendum was the result of a peace deal between the government and the Moro Islamic Liberation Front (MILF).