ISIS’ Reach Extends to Southeast Asia

Just days before Indonesia’s Independence Day celebration, Indonesian police foiled a chemical bomb attack on Tuesday that targeted the presidential palace in Jakarta. They arrested five suspects belonging to Jemaah Ansharut Daulah, an Indonesian Islamist terror organization with ties to ISIS that is responsible for several recent attacks against Indonesian police.

Meanwhile, in the Philippines, the fight between government forces and militants from the ISIS-linked Maute and Abu Sayyaf groups in the city of Marawi has claimed more than 700 lives and has entered its third month. Authorities believe that militants came from as far as Saudi Arabia and Chechnya to join the ISIS affiliate, though a majority of the foreign fighters hail from Indonesia and Malaysia.