ISIS in the Philippines?

ISIS' first propaganda video of a Filipino training camp has been released.

The first propaganda footage for Filipino ISIS recruits has been released by the jihad extremists.

LOS ANGELES, CA (Catholic Online) - The footage has been removed from several websites, but remains on DailyMail, where you can see Philippine soldiers training at the first ISIS training camp in the Asian Pacific.

Several Islamic extremist commanders are featured, urging Filipinos to join ISIS in Syria, adding that their first terror camp has opened in one of the Philippine jungles.

The video includes "soldiers of the Caliphate in the Philippines" exercising and running training courses as well as assault drills. Some are shown climbing rope ladders, crawling beneath barbed wire and training with weapons.

Despite claims from the Filipino government that the only people interested in helping ISIS within the Philippines are bandits claiming allegiance, the video included several Filipinos. 

Eight members of a Filipino gang that swore allegiance to ISIS were killed last month when the Filipino military engaged in a firefight with the group in the southern part of the country last month.

The battle lasted an hour within the predominantly Catholic city of Palimbang. Major Filemon Tan said the men were part of Ansar al-Khalifa, a small gang that allied itself with ISIS in a video that made its way around the world last year.

Abu Sayyaf, a much larger group, is reported to have pledged alliance to ISIS and is currently holding at least four foreign nationals hostage. Abu Sayyaf has demanded millions of dollars in ransom and released videos threatening the hostages with execution.

Tan allegedly told AFP that five black flags, similar to ISIS flags, were recovered from the bandits following the firefight.

National military spokesman Colonel Restituto Padilla told AFP, "This group is trying to ride on the popularity of the ISIS, but they're not really ISIS. We view them as mere criminal gangs."

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