Friday, April 12, 2019

‘Leave or die’

From the Business Mirror (Apr 13 2019): ‘Leave or die’

Military vows to keep out extremists from PHL shores after IS defeat in Syria


In this October 19, 2017, file photo, Philippine Navy commandos aboard a gunboat patrol Lake Lanao as smoke rises where pro-Islamic group militants are making a final stand amid a massive military offensive of Marawi City in southern Philippines.

THE capture by US-backed forces of the last stronghold of the Islamic State (IS) in Syria last month that spelled the terrorist group’s defeat has put on alert countries where the IS has put up so-called caliphate provinces, including the Philippines, and to be exact, Lanao del Sur, or even the whole of Mindanao.

The alert was borne by the belief that these countries, whose citizens have enlisted as IS fighters, or are hosting jihadist groups allied with the IS, should brace for the influx of returning fighters following the collapse of their group’s adventure in Syria.


In this June 9, 2017, file photo, debris fly in the air as Philippine Air Force fighter jets bomb suspected locations of Muslim militants in Marawi City.

The notion was bolstered by reports from counterterrorism groups, including Israel’s Meir Amit Intelligence and Information Center, that even before IS’s defeat, it has already ordered its various provinces to step up their attacks while strengthening their information communication apparatus in order to recruit fighters and members.
IS done in Lanao

While the warning could not be taken lightly, Col. Romeo Brawner, commander of the Army’s 103rd Brigade headquartered right in the heart of Marawi City in Lanao del Sur, said the IS and its mixture of local fighters are already finished in the province.

The IS and its fighters mostly made up of members of the Abu Sayyaf Group (ASG) and Maute Group attacked Marawi in 2017, and stretched the war to a five-month costly operation by the military that left in ruins the entire city, once one of Mindanao’s most progressive Islamic cities.

The government declared at the end of the campaign that it would take years before the IS, or even any home-grown terrorist group, can mount a siege in the scale of the Marawi attack again, given the death of its leaders and fighters and the continuing decline of its influence.

Military officials even confidently declared that the siege would be the last in the country’s battle against terrorism, jihadism and Islamic radicalization.

“No more, they are done here,” said Brawner as he not only echoed the line of the military leadership, but cited the progress of their operations against the IS and its followers, now tagged by the military as Dawla Islamiyah.

Death of leaders, surrender
Brawner said the IS, even if it attempts to recruit, may find it overwhelmingly difficult to recover in Lanao del Sur. In fact, he said, IS is already on its way to oblivion, given the successive deaths of its leaders and the consistent surrender of its followers and sympathizers as a result of the continuing operations by Brawner’s Army brigade.

The military commander declared that Owaydah Marohombsar alias Abu Dar, the remaining leader of the Maute Group and the IS, whose group was the focus of the operations in Lanao, is already dead as confirmed by the result of a DNA examination.

“He’s dead. It was confirmed by the DNA results released this week,” Brawner told the BusinessMirror in a phone interview.

Brawner and his men killed Abu Dar and four of his fighters during a military operation on March 14 this year in Tubaran, Lanao del Sur, but until then, official confirmation could not be made until DNA tests are made.

Abu Dar cropped up as the leader of the IS when Isnilon Hapilon, commander of the ASG and the acknowledged leader of the IS in Southeast Asia, was killed during the Marawi siege.

Abu Dar, who fought alongside the fallen regional IS leader during the Marawi attack, escaped during the initial months of the war and has been the object of focused military operations since then.

The death of Abu Dar followed the successive killings of his key leaders by soldiers who scoured the jungle and operated nonstop in various areas of Lanao del Sur just to get them.

“The death of Abu Dar lends to the end of the IS here,” Brawner said, adding that up to his death, the terrorist leader only had no more than 25 fighters.

“He was a preacher,” he added, underscoring the capability of Abu Dar to recruit members if he would still be alive.

Other than killing the leaders of the IS and operating continuously against the group, the military has secured the surrender of at least 160 IS followers and sympathizers since Brawner assumed his post as 103rd Brigade commander.

Brawner, a Special Forces by training, said they would hunt IS members to the last man, while guarding against any effort of the group to recruit.
Operations in other terrorist areas

Since the IS and its influence are declining in Lanao, the military understood that other areas and even groups, including those still aligned with the international terrorist group, could take on the void left by the IS in Marawi City or even Lanao.

This is the reason operations have been stepped up in Sulu and Basilan and in Central Mindanao, and focused on the ASG and the Bangsa­moro Islamic Freedom Fighters (BIFF) and its faction aligned with the IS.

The military earlier said that the BIFF and its faction that pledged its allegiance to the IS have forged a tactical alliance in Maguindanao in their effort to stave off the continuing government operation that has already killed its key leaders.

In Sulu, soldiers were also operating against the ASG in the province, with the focus of the operations trained against ASG Commander Hatib Hadjan Sawadjaan, tagged as the leader of the Jolo cathedral suicide bombing in January this year that killed 23 people and wounded 95 others.

The IS owned up to the bombing, with a US report saying Sawadjaan is acting as the leader of the IS in country.

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