In our prayers: Church bombings in SriLanka

three churches (two Catholic and one Protestant) and two hotels were bombed by terrorists in Colombo, Sri Lanka. The churches were targeted during Easter Services. Over 200 dead, including a few foreigners (but no Filipinos).

BBC report talks with locals and witnesses.

There had been a wicked civil war between ethnic groups (locals, who are mainly Buddhists, vs Tamils, who are Hindu, Christian, and Muslim) until about ten years ago, but things have been peaceful since then.

UKMail has the background of religious tensions there, including that there were warnings of a coming attack from Islamic extremist groups, but apparently no security was done.

of course, with the large crowds, security is difficult.

more at AlJ, including the story that last year there were anti Muslim attacks after rumors on social media reported Buddhist shrines being attacked.

wikipedia has more on the anti Muslim riots by militant Buddhists/

If this was payback for the anti Muslim attacks, then why were churches and tourism centers/hotels attacked? 

and if this was related to the ethnic civil war of the past, then why target Christian churches, which include both ethnic groups? (or do they have separate services with different languages, as we had in the USA for immigrants, allowing them to target a certain ethnic group of Christians?)

One suspects this is more metastases from the ISIS types in the Middle east coming home to spread terror, but I have no evidence for this: however, we are worried about these types here in the Philippines causing problems and paying local militants to do their dirty work.

Here in the Philippines, when you enter the mall, you are screened: wanded down with a metal detectors, and sometimes even frisked, and your bags are checked. But protecting crowds at church is more difficult.

We had a cathedral bombed in the Southern Philippines awhile back,

but locally the main reason we have cops or security personnel, including the military, in our churches or on the street is because of threats of violence between political clans in election year.

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update: The UK SUN (tabloid) also suspects returning ISIS types behind the bombing

Fighters from Sri Lanka have been mentioned in ISIS ranks and the country would be “easily accessible” for its supporters in the region, Ms Katz said. Southeast Asia, particularly the Philippines and Indonesia, have “seen a surge of central-coordinated ISIS activity” in what it dubs its “East Asia Province.”