By Regine Cabato
MANILA -- Investigators here are working to figure out what the two suspects in the killing of 15 people at a Hanukkah celebration in Australia were doing in the remote southern Philippines in the weeks before crowds massing on Sydney's Bondi Beach were targeted.
Australia's prime minister said the shooters appeared to have been inspired by Islamic State. Police said they found two black, homemade Islamic State flags along with improvised explosive devices in a car registered to a 24-year-old Australian, Naveed Akram, who was charged Wednesday with 15 counts of murder and committing a terrorist act. His 50-year-old father, Indian national Sajid Akram, was shot by police at the scene and killed.
Now security officials in the Philippines are tracing the two men's movements in the south of the country to determine whether their presence there indicates a resurgence in terrorist activity a decade after a raft of Islamist militants swore allegiance to Islamic State.
Investigators in the country are trying to find out whether the Akrams traveled to the Philippines to receive any firearms or similar training. The Philippines National Bureau of Investigation said it is coordinating with police and armed forces to retrace the pair's movements from Nov. 1 to Nov. 28.
Who they met and where they stayed could prove pivotal in determining what they were doing, NBI spokesman Palmer Mallari said.
The southern region of Mindanao has long been vulnerable to conflict and extremist activity. Muslim nationalist groups such as the Moro National Liberation Front and the Moro Islamic Liberation Front for decades fought guerrilla wars for a degree of autonomy from the predominantly Christian Philippines. Poverty and inequality deepened the fault lines between the two communities, with extremist factions such as Abu Sayyaf later emerging to pledge allegiance first to al Qaeda and then Islamic State.
In 2017, militants loyal to Islamic State joined forces to lay siege to the city of Marawi. The monthslong battle left over 1,000 dead and 350,000 displaced.
The region has sometimes drawn foreign attention, too.
Militants from Indonesia and Egypt were responsible for suicide bombings in the southwestern Philippines from 2019 to 2020, according to data tracked by the International Centre for Counter-Terrorism in the Netherlands. In previous decades, foreign nationals also traveled to training camps run by the Moro Islamic Liberation Front to prepare them for attacks elsewhere in Asia, security officials say.
The situation has stabilized in recent years following a peace agreement with the Islamic Liberation Front, the largest mainstream Muslim secessionist group, and the creation of an autonomous Muslim region. In June, the government declared the island of Basilan in southwestern Mindanao free of the Abu Sayyaf group, and in November said the Dawla Islamiyah-Maute Group was no longer active in what had been its main base in central Mindanao.
Presidential spokeswoman Claire Castro told reporters Wednesday that President Ferdinand Marcos Jr. rejects suggestions that the Philippines is a hot spot for Islamic State training. She quoted the head of the country's National Security Council as saying such characterizations are misleading, and that violence in the southern Philippines is largely driven by historical conflicts and clan feuds.
Militant attacks are now less common than when the Abu Sayyaf group turned mass kidnapping into a cottage industry. The groups that have expressed loyalty to Islamic State are now ethno-linguistically and regionally distinct, and their numbers have dwindled, said Georgi Engelbrecht, a senior analyst at the International Crisis Group.
"It is hard to quantify, but all in all we're looking at between a few dozen and more than hundred fighters or operatives, at least based on some estimates over the last months," he said. The Philippine military on Tuesday said the number of people involved with these localized extremist groups had fallen to 50 from over 1,200 in 2016.
Still, clan wars and persistent paramilitary activity mean firearms are widely accessible, while shooting ranges in cities such as Davao are numerous and affordable.
Engelbrecht noted that the shooters didn't necessarily have to meet with Islamic State operatives or sympathizers to get military training. They could have practiced at gun ranges or liaised with sympathizers.
"Why did they come to the Philippines and not other countries in the region, and what did they do?" he said of the Akrams. "We need to know this before making more qualified assessments."
Drieza Lininding, chairman of the civil society group Moro Consensus Group, said it shouldn't be ruled out that the pair visited relatives in Davao, which has an Indian community, or that they could have planned to travel to Siargao, a surf spot where there may have been Israeli tourists.
He said it was doubtful that remaining militant stragglers had the capacity to even offer training.
"Maybe in the deep jungle where no one can find them, but with foreigners...they can be easily spotted and [reported]," said Lininding. "Based on the video -- [being] disarmed by a bystander -- there is nothing to suggest they were trained."
Still, analysts said the incident should be taken as a warning to the Philippine government against becoming complacent against homegrown terror threats.
Under Marcos, the country's security priority has shifted to external defense as the Philippines comes under growing pressure from China along its maritime border.
Acram Latiph, executive director of the Institute for Peace and Development in Mindanao and an economics professor at the Mindanao State University in Marawi City, said authorities should collaborate with civil society to curb any signs of extremism. "It was Ahmed the bystander who helped disarm one of the shooters," said Latiph, referring to Ahmed el Ahmed, a shopkeeper who threw himself at one of the suspects on Sunday.
"The community, especially the religious sector, can play a vital role in an anti-radicalization campaign," he said.
(END) Dow Jones Newswires
December 17, 2025 07:28 ET (12:28 GMT)
Copyright (c) 2025 Dow Jones & Company, Inc.
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