NY Times Is Wrong. Duterte Knew About ISIS and Let the Problem Grow

The New York Times, perennial thorn in Duterete's side, has given him another prick.

https://www.nytimes.com/2017/06/10/world/asia/duterte-philippines-isis-marawi.html?_r=0

A president who has focused on a deadly antidrug campaign that has claimed the lives of thousands of Filipinos seems to have been caught unprepared for a militant threat that has been festering in the south for years. 

“The government has largely been in denial about the growth of ISIS and affiliated groups,” said Zachary M. Abuza, a professor at the National War College in Washington who specializes in Southeast Asian security issues. “Duterte has been preoccupied with his campaign of gutting the rule of law by using police and other security forces for the extrajudicial killing of drug pushers.”

This is a half-truth.  While it's true the AFP has been caught with its pants down even though they have been battling Muslims terrorist groups for the the past few decades, Duterte was fully aware of the growing threat of ISIS.

http://globalnation.inquirer.net/150199/duterte-isis-creeping-ph-maute-group

http://www.reuters.com/article/us-philippines-security-idUSKBN1390U4

Duterte knew full well the threat of ISIS.  The man is from Mindanao.  He is no fool.  But tucked deep in that New York Times article is the key to the whole matter.

Historic grievances among the Muslim Moro people there, widespread poverty and large lawless areas have helped create an opportunity for the Islamic State. A peace process pursued by Mr. Duterte’s predecessor, President Benigno S. Aquino III, faltered in 2015 and has remained deadlocked under Mr. Duterte. 

“It was not the spread of ISIS in Iraq and Syria that fueled ISIS cells in the Philippines, but the collapse of the peace process,” said Mr. Abuza of the National War College.

EXACTLY!  

The peace process has failed. And it has failed on purpose.  Duterte was never going give the Muslims Mindanao.  The BBL would destroy Philippine sovereignty in the region.  Besides that the Muslims have killed too many innocents over the years for any sane man to give them the large island of Mindanao. The Day of Reckoning must come for the Muslims who have spilled rivers of blood over the years.

Duterte said in 2015 before he entered the presidential race that he would run a a dictatorship.

http://www.rappler.com/nation/politics/elections/2016/110679-duterte-contradictions-dictatorship

He said in January 2017 that he would declare marital law if he wanted too.

http://www.rappler.com/nation/158376-duterte-declare-martial-law-want-to

And this is EXACTLY what he did in May.  

http://cnnphilippines.com/news/2017/05/31/duterte-no-one-recommended-martial-law-declaration.html

It's not such a convoluted plan. Duterte initiated a phoney peace process with the communists and the Muslims and let the ISIS problem grow until the inevitable turning point came when it all descended into chaos and he would have moral authority to declare martial law.  It's what he said he would do before he even entered the presidential race.  It's what he said he would do in January 2017. And now that martial law is in Mindanao it is not going anywhere anytime soon.

http://news.abs-cbn.com/news/05/31/17/mindanao-needs-martial-law-even-if-military-can-contain-maute-lorenzana

I have written a longer and more detailed history of this plan that can be read here:  http://philippinefails.blogspot.com/2017/06/martial-law-was-always-dutertes-plan.html

Please read through that article and realise that for Duterte, marital law was always the plan.

Fake Honey

A few years back I bought a bottle of honey at the grocery store.  It was delicious.  It made my coffee taste sweet.  But then I was told that it was probably fake. Just sugar syrup. Not honey. I couldn't believe it but I couldn't shake the idea either so I ended up testing the honey by pouring a spoonful into a glass of water. The water test says if the honey dissolves then its not real honey.  

The honey dissolved and I was very disappointed.

But I really wanted honey so the search began. At one point I even bought a bottle from a guy on the street who had a bucket full of sweet sticky honey. There was even a honeycomb with a bee on it in the bucket.  He filled a bottle, I took it back home, and it turned out to be fake. Eventually I did find real honey from local sellers and direct from bee farms but it's usually expensive and so few and far between. A special treat.

A few months ago I found honey being sold at SM Bacolod at a store called "Sabor Illonggo."  It looked good.  It was fairly inexpensive. It was in a store selling local delicacies. So I bought it.  Great taste.  Just like honey.  And then, a few months later, it happened.

"That's probably not real honey."

What? After all this time I have been buying this stuff and now you tell me? But the bottle says real honey. From the island of Mindanao. And it tastes like honey. How can it be fake? Why would  specialty store selling regional delicacies be selling fake honey?

Today a few bottles of real honey from a bee farm in Dolores, Quezon in Luzon arrived. So it was time to put the honey to the test.

The bottle labeled Camiguin Honey is the honey I buy from the mall. The other bottle is raw honey recently arrived from Luzon.

Two glasses of cold water for the test.

Already it's not looking good for the Camiguin honey.  See how light the colour is and how it slides around the spoon?  The other honey is dark and forms an almost perfect circle while staying in place.

The results of the test:  the Camiguin honey completely dissolves in the water while the honey from Luzon sinks to the bottom of the glass.  The Camiguin honey is not honey. Not pure honey anyway.

The taste is different too. The Camiguin honey is sweet and mild while the Laguna raw honey is sharp and tangy. 

It's hard to believe that Camiguin Honey is fake honey but that appears to be the case.  I do not want to sweeten my coffee with sugar syrup so I won't be buying anymore bottles.

Fake honey seems to be a real problem in the Philippines. You can read all about it here: http://beephilippines.info/honey-fraud/.

Aside from companies manufacturing and selling fake honey it must be wondered how the large supermarkets allow this fake honey to be sold in their stores.  Don't they do any sort of quality control and inspection of the companies they deal with? Aren't they aware of FDA warnings and regulations? CEM is the king of fake honey and yet can be found in stores throughout the Philippines.  Why?

Because nobody cares.  The supermarkets and the suppliers only want the money.  They think their customers are too stupid to realise they are buying fake honey. With enforcement of the law being lax at every level of society it is not too far-fetched to say the FDA doesn't care either. And Filipinos do not complain. You sell a Filipino fake honey and they will try to find a way to make apples out of oranges rather than demand the store give a refund and discontinue selling the fake honey.

If you live in Iloilo or Bacolod do not shop at "Sabor Illonggo."  And definitely do not buy the fake honey they are selling.

Manila is The Worst Place in South East Asia

Manila tops a survey once again!

http://www.gmanetwork.com/news/lifestyle/travel/613535/manila-tops-worst-place-in-south-east-asia-survey/story/

That's got to be a slap in the face. 

Manila is the worst place they’ve ever been to, according to travelers polled by travel guide South East Asia Backpacker. 

Pollution, deficient infrastructure, lack of safety, and being overcrowded are among the many factors that helped us land at number 1 on the list that no country ever wants to top, obviously. 

While Manila got pogi points for its “friendly” and “lovely humans,” it’s hard to argue with 17 votes that included terrible tales of getting robbed by a taxi and getting grabbed while walking down a street. 

Cebu also made the unfortunate list, landing at number 10 with six votes. Travelers described the Queen City of the South as “dirty,” “noisy,” “polluted,” and “all shopping malls and no culture.”

Congratulations Manila!  

This is not the first time Manila or the Philippines has been number one at being the worst.  Did you know Manila has the worst traffic, the Philippines is the global epicentre of on-line child pronography, or that the Philippines tops Asia for the number of teen pregnancies?

To read more about what the Philippines and Manila are number one at follow the link below!

http://philippinefails.blogspot.com/2017/04/the-philippines-is-number-one.html

Is ISIS in the Philippines or Not?

There are conflicting reports of whether or not ISIS is in the Philippines.  Let's take look at the timeline of ISIS in the Philippines.

October 02, 2014

http://www.philstar.com/headlines/2014/10/02/1375654/islamic-state-popularity-growing-philippines

December 21, 2015

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-3368646/ISIS-unveil-Philippines-new-breeding-ground-jihadis-latest-propaganda-video-featuring-secret-Filipino-jungle-training-camp.html

January 14, 2016

http://globalnation.inquirer.net/135083/analysts-isis-a-real-threat-to-ph

February 04, 2016

http://www.philstar.com/headlines/2016/02/04/1549519/us-closely-monitoring-isis-threat-philippines-southeast-asia

February 17, 2016

http://www.rappler.com/nation/122649-jihadist-groups-allegiance-isis

April 14, 2016

http://time.com/4293395/isis-zamboanga-mindanao-moro-islamist-terrorist-asia-philippines-abu-sayyaf/

The caption of this photo reads:

Philippine army soldiers stage a counterterrorism operation against Maute terrorists, who are allegedly linked with ISIS, in Butig, the Philippine province of Lanao Del Sur, in Mindanao Island, on March 1, 2016

So the AFP knew that Maute was linked with ISIS back in March 2016 and likely even before that!

April 15, 2016

http://www.philstar.com/headlines/2016/04/15/1573113/there-isis-presence-philippines-experts-disagree

June 22, 2016

http://www.philstar.com/headlines/2016/06/22/1595580/isis-releases-first-propaganda-video-philippines

July 7, 2016

http://www.philstar.com/nation/2016/07/07/1600470/police-says-no-isis-presence-davao-city

Here we have the first official denial of ISIS being in the Philippines despite all the evidence to the contrary as seen in the headlines above.

November 28, 2016

http://globalnation.inquirer.net/150199/duterte-isis-creeping-ph-maute-group

February 27, 2017

http://www.foxnews.com/world/2017/02/27/philippine-militants-release-video-germans-beheading.html

April 06, 2017

http://globalnation.inquirer.net/154434/2-suspected-isis-members-arrested-ph

May 24, 2017

https://www.gmanetwork.com/news/news/nation/611906/no-isis-presence-in-phl-afp-pnp/story/

Given everything above how can the AFP and PNP make such an asinine and ludicrous statement as "We don't have ISIS in the Philippines?"  These people are either stupid or treacherous.  It is patently obvious to outside and inside observers that ISIS has been a growing threat in the Philippines for some time. Duterte explicitly linked Maute to ISIS in November 2016 based on intelligence reports he had received. DID the AFP not get these reports?

Did the AFP forget that Maute raised the black flag of ISIS in November 2016 when they took over the town of Butig?

http://news.abs-cbn.com/news/11/27/16/army-presses-offensive-in-maute-held-lanao-town

May 25, 2017

http://www.gmanetwork.com/news/news/nation/612140/mindanao-terrorist-groups-forged-unity-under-isis-security-analyst/story

May 29, 2017

http://www.philstar.com/headlines/2017/05/29/1704755/duterte-bestows-isis-status-maute-group

This article is very misleading. Maute group was known to have ISIS links long before Duterte "bestowed ISIS status on Maute group." Duterte said this explicitly in November 2016.

June 05, 2017

http://newsinfo.inquirer.net/902660/1200-is-operatives-in-ph-says-indonesia

http://www.sunstar.com.ph/manila/local-news/2017/06/05/afp-surprised-reported-presence-1200-isis-operatives-philippines-545751

How much more proof does one need?  These people say they are ISIS, they adhere to ISIS ideology, they fly the flag of ISIS, and ISIS has encouraged jihadis to flock to the Philippines. 

The conclusion is that ISIS is indeed in the Philippines and has been in the Philippines for a few years now silently growing in strength while the AFP has ignored them as not being really ISIS but only wannabes.

How can the public believe anything the AFP says regarding the presence of ISIS when they are either lying about or ignoring the threat?

http://newsinfo.inquirer.net/882639/afp-no-reported-presence-of-maute-group-in-metro-manila

Keep Calm and Remember Saudi Arabia Also Supports ISIS

Qatar has been accused of supporting Islamic terrorism by its neighbours and now everyone is freaking out because of the resulting backlash.  Especially hit with fear are all the OFWs in Qatar.

http://news.abs-cbn.com/overseas/06/05/17/ph-embassy-pinoys-in-qatar-should-remain-calm

Overseas Filipino workers based in Qatar should remain calm, the Philippine embassy in Doha said Tuesday after 7 countries cut ties and closed their borders with the kingdom. 

Philippine Ambassador to Qatar Alan Timbayan, in an advisory, said Filipinos in Qatar should "exercise prudence as we all closely monitor the situation". 

Doha alone is home to some 220,000 Filipino workers, according to the Qatar Ministry of Foreign Affairs. 

Arab nations including Saudi Arabia and Egypt on Monday cut ties with Qatar, accusing it of supporting extremism, in the biggest diplomatic crisis to hit the region in years.

With the recent visit to Qatar by Duterte and with the major inroads ISIS has made in the Philippines which has led directly to the declaration of martial law in Mindanao this situation intimately involves the Philippines. 

http://newsinfo.inquirer.net/902660/1200-is-operatives-in-ph-says-indonesia

Is Qatar supporting terrorism in the Middle East?  Is Qatar financing terrorism abroad?  The answer to both questions is yes. And they are not alone.

http://www.salon.com/2016/10/11/leaked-hillary-clinton-emails-show-u-s-allies-saudi-arabia-and-qatar-supported-isis/

“We need to use our diplomatic and more traditional intelligence assets to bring pressure on the governments of Qatar and Saudi Arabia, which are providing clandestine financial and logistic support to ISIL and other radical Sunni groups in the region,” the document states. 

This adds to a growing body of evidence that theocratic Gulf monarchies have helped fuel the surge of extremist groups throughout the Middle East.

Another newly released email, from January 2016, includes an excerpt from a private October 2013 speech in which Clinton acknowledged that “the Saudis have exported more extreme ideology than any other place on earth over the course of the last 30 years.” 

In that same speech, Clinton noted that she wanted to pursue “a more robust, covert action trying to vet, identify, train and arm cadres of rebels” in Syria, that would have fought both the government of President Bashar al-Assad and “the Al-Qaeda-related jihadist groups that have, unfortunately, been attracted to Syria.” 

She added however, “That’s been complicated by the fact that the Saudis and others are shipping large amounts of weapons — and pretty indiscriminately — not at all targeted toward the people that we think would be the more moderate, least likely, to cause problems in the future.”

For Saudi Arabia to condemn it's neighbour for supporting terrorism is subterfuge.  It is the same old tactic of accusing your enemy of your crimes. Call it blame shifting or gas lighting or psychological projection, its the same song and a classic technique used by dubious groups looking to get the spotlight off them.

Not only does Saudi Arabia finance ISIS with money and weapons but they also share the same ideology, Wahhabism.

http://www.newstatesman.com/world-affairs/2014/11/wahhabism-isis-how-saudi-arabia-exported-main-source-global-terrorism

James Woolsey, CIA director in 2014 affirmed: ‘Wahhabi extremism today is the soil in which al-Qaeda and its sister terrorist organizations are growing’.  

Wahhabi petro-dollars finance so called “charities” and the madrassa system (Islamic schools) in many Middle and Far Eastern countries (such as Pakistan), contributing significantly to the rise of radicalism in those areas. 

The evidence for Saudi financing of its “hate” ideology around the world, even the support of ISIS, is clear. Currently living in Iraq, researching Islamic militancy, I’ve occasionally been invited by Asayaish (Kurdish Intelligence Agency) to sit in at interviews of captured ISIS fighters. 

Many of these jihadists openly state their warped Wahhabi beliefs; the support they receive from Riyadh, and their hatred of the West.

http://www.mirror.co.uk/news/uk-news/what-wahhabism-puritanical-code-islam-10564342

Saudi Arabia also has direct ties to the events of 9/11.

http://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2016/jul/19/911-report-details-saudi-arabia-funding-of-muslim-/

Saudi Arabia was funding Muslim radicalism in mosques and charities at the time the Sept. 11, 2001, hijackers were gathering in the United States and making contacts with Saudi nationals, according to a declassified intelligence document. 

To jihad watchers, the paper confirms their charges that the Saudi government and its wealthy citizens fund extremist teachings in America. To this day, the kingdom is pressing its harsh Wahhabi Sunni Islam on American Muslims as it seeks to spread Islam around the world, they say. 

In the document, one Saudi who was receiving money from Prince Bandar bin Sultan, Riyadh’s ambassador to the U.S. at the time, made a startling statement to an FBI informant. The man, who had ties to some of the hijackers, told agents that it would do the U.S. no good to limit entry visas because a sufficient number of Muslims were already in the country to destroy it and create an Islamic state.

The short of it is that Saudi Arabia along with Qatar are both supporters, financially and ideologically, of terrorism through the region and the world.  To anyone who has been paying attention this is not new.  From the beginning the Muslims have been not a religion of peaceful men seeking God but a religion of warriors bent on conquering the world in the name of Allah.

Muslims consider non-Muslims as "kafir."

The Koran says that the Kafir may be deceived, plotted against, hated, enslaved, mocked, tortured and worse. The word is usually translated as “unbeliever” but this translation is wrong. The word “unbeliever” is logically and emotionally neutral, whereas, Kafir is the most abusive, prejudiced and hateful word in any language. 

There are many religious names for Kafirs: polytheists, idolaters, People of the Book (Christians and Jews), Buddhists, atheists, agnostics, and pagans. Kafir covers them all, because no matter what the religious name is, they can all be treated the same. What Mohammed said and did to polytheists can be done to any other category of Kafir.

https://www.politicalislam.com/sharia-law-for-non-muslims-chapter-5-the-kafir/

It's time for Filipinos to pull their heads out of the sand.  Islam is the same now as it was in 630 when under the leadership of Mohammed Mecca was captured and much blood was spilled in the desert sand.  Islam is a religion of war and not peace. They will never be at peace with non-believers.  

The OFWs in the Middle East experience much abuse at the hands of the Muslims because they are non-believers.  They are "kafir."  It is time to stop sending OFWs to the Middle East.

ISIS is in the Philippines and there should be no doubt that they are supported by Saudi Arabia and Qatar and who-knows-else. It is because of the support that Saudi Arabia and Qatar gives to ISIS that I wrote in a previous article that Duterte was on a fool's errand when he visited the Middle East and made huge economic deals with Saudi Arabia and promised Qatar that they can use the Philippine army if they need it.  You can read it here.

Martial Law in Mindanao: It Has to be Brand New

So much has happened during this second week of martial law in Mindanao which Duterte declared all on his own with no recommendation from anyone.

http://cnnphilippines.com/news/2017/05/31/duterte-no-one-recommended-martial-law-declaration.html

Remember that rape joke Duterte made to his troops?  Well Chelsea Clinton didn't like it.

And Duterte didn't care for her criticism.

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-4558362/Philippines-president-Duterte-hits-Chelsea-Clinton.html

But it turns out it was all a misunderstanding.  Duterte never made a rape joke. It was just sarcasm.

http://nypost.com/2017/06/01/duterte-claims-his-rape-joke-was-just-sarcasm/

Is Duterte the most meta-comic or what? He's like a Filipino Mitch Hedberg.  

Martial law became official this week when Congress finally approved the decree.

http://newsinfo.inquirer.net/901512/martial-law-gets-congress-ok

The Supreme Court may also get a say but Duterte and his coalition in the Senate don't care.

http://newsinfo.inquirer.net/902817/senators-shrug-off-sc-case-vs-mindanao-martial-law

And now that its finally arrived don't expect it to be going anywhere anytime soon. 

http://news.abs-cbn.com/news/05/31/17/mindanao-needs-martial-law-even-if-military-can-contain-maute-lorenzana

Even IF the military can contain Maute?  IF??  Does he not have any faith in the fighting prowess of the Armed Forces of the Philippines? 

http://newsinfo.inquirer.net/901067/pnp-chief-confirms-maute-group-has-taken-saf-armored-personnel-carrier

http://www.sunstar.com.ph/manila/local-news/2017/06/02/afp-friendly-fire-killed-10-soldiers-not-11-545286

Well if the AFP can't fight the terrorists successfully maybe they need some help.  Who will they call since the USA has been told in no uncertain terms "yankee go home?"

https://www.yahoo.com/news/duterte-says-philippines-stop-taking-second-hand-u-153947161.html

"I will no longer accept second-hand military equipment," Duterte told soldiers at an army base on the southern island of Mindanao. "I do not want those given by the Americans. During my time, I will not have second-hand ships. It has to be brand new." 

Duterte said he would acquire new and modern weapons systems "even if I have to spend double the money," and would look at buying equipment such as planes, boats, drones and guns from China and Russia, traditional rivals of its closest ally, the United States.

Has to be brand new??  Spend double the money??  Of course he means borrow money from China and Russia to buy arms from China and Russia.  Does he realise that even US Army personnel use outdated equipment and is still a force to be reckoned with?  The Philippines is in the middle of a decades long war on terror with several groups and Duterte will spend double the money on weapons and further plunge the Philippines into debt just to spite the USA?

http://www.philstar.com/headlines/2017/06/05/1706972/us-turns-over-rifles-counterterrorism-equipment-marines

Let's hope he is just being sarcastic.

So he's demanding brand new weapons and the SAF and AFP can't contain the Maute group or even stop the threats posed by Abu Sayyaf or MNLF, MILF, or the NPA. Who will he get to bail him out of this mess?

http://newsinfo.inquirer.net/902628/duterte-accepts-misuari-offer-of-2000-men-to-fight-is

http://newsinfo.inquirer.net/902607/ph-govt-has-accepted-communists-offer-to-fight-maute-group

That's right. MNLF terrorists and communist NPA rebels will be fighting alongside the AFP whom they have been fighting and killing for years.

If the rape joke was intended to boost morale then this turn of events will surely put it through the roof!

Burning the Sugarcane Fields

The final step of the sugarcane harvest is burning the fields.  After the crop is gone a mess of dried and dead stalks is left over.  Burning the harvested fields gets rid of the dried stalks making ploughing and sowing the field anew much easier.  

"Field burning removes all post-harvest trash left on the soil surface," said Windell Jackson, senior agronomist with the American Sugar Cane League. "Leaving the cut sugar cane leaves to compost on the ground prevents the sun from heating up the soil. Leaving mulch in the field keeps the soil damp and promotes fungus and other plant disease growth — diseases that damage and kill the sugar cane root."

http://www.houmatoday.com/news/20121220/sugar-cane-burning-is-necessary 

The burning is controlled.  Unlike homeowners burning trash and leaves, the sugarcane workers do not abandon the fire but guide it properly so that the fire does not spread to other fields.  However they cannot control the smoke which covers the entire countryside choking the life out of anyone who wants to breathe.  

 

Aside from the nasty pollution the burning is usually safe because it is supervised.  But even supervision cannot render this burning completely safe since the fire is licking right up on an electrical tower.

There is nothing safe about this at all.  Even if a fence was placed around the tower the potential for danger would not be gone.  

At least the cell tower is protected by a wall.

But still the potential for something extremely dangerous to occur has not totally disappeared.  That wall is covered in graffiti.  Let's take a close up and read what it says.

"If you think this is bad you should see what our government is up to"

As George Takei would say, "Oh my!"