Manila bomb: We are safe

Last week a small bomb went off in Manila during the ASEAN meeting, but now another 2 bombs went off. 

We are safe: We live far north of the city, and it was in a different area than where Joy and Ruby were visiting yesterday.

This happened in the old city, in Quiapo.

Police said it had nothing to do with terrorism, and said it might be drug gang related,  but AlJ is noted that it was only "100 yards" from the large mosque there.

The explosions occurred near an Islamic community centre and about a hundred metres from the Quiapo Golden Mosque, damaging part of the Islamic centre and shattering windows in nearby buildings.
"It was very powerful," Omar Yahya, 22, who was at the Islamic centre when the first explosion hit, told the AFP. "Windows were broken and the wooden part of the building collapsed".
Manila was also hit by an explosion last week. At least 14 people were wounded on April 28 when a home-made pipe bomb was detonated in the district of Quiapo.

here is an article about the Mosque,

One thing you have to realize is that small bombs go off all the time here. Usually they are payback against businesses who don't pay a gift to the local  insurgencies we have here. Usually they are set off not to ill people, just warn the guys to pay up..

There is a big overlap with these low grade insurgencies and with crime. Think Mafia and you get the idea.

The big worry, however, is that there have been some professional AlQaeda type bomb makers teaching locals in the south on how to make efficient bombs, like the big one that killed quite a few people in a Davao market last year to warn Duterte to lay off fighting militant Muslims in the south.

Rappler has a longer story on the bombing, with details... one bomb went off as it was being delivered, and it had the name of a certain person who was targeted.

but the police tell people not to speculate who or what is behind the bomb, but because the bomb was targeted to a certain person, they doubted that terrorism as the cause.