Authorities on full alert to ensure peaceful Eid in ARMM

COTABATO CITY --- The police today started deploying uniformed personnel in designated sites for Monday’s congregational Eid’l Adha outdoor prayers in the Autonomous Region in Muslim Mindanao in anticipation of any attempt by radical groups to sabotage the event.
There are threats from the Abu Sayyaf to disrupt the Eid’l Adha celebration in certain areas in Basilan and Sulu.
Soldiers belonging to units of the Army’s 6th Infantry Division have visibly been guarding strategic spots along stretches of the Cotabato-Gen. Santos Highway in three Maguindanao towns where there are forces of the outlawed Bangsamoro Islamic Freedom Fighters (BIFF).
The Abu Sayyaf and the BIFF differ in each other’s revolutionary objectives, but are one in their allegiance to the Independent State of Iraq and Syria and have a common denominator - that of espousing animosity to non-Muslims.The Eid’l Adha is feast of sacrifice” in Islam, an important event for Muslims which they celebrate during the 10th day of Dhul-Hijjah in the Islamic lunar-based Hijrah calendar, where they go out to perform open-field congregational prayers.
This year’s Eid’l Adha corresponds to September 12 in the Gregorian calendar, which Malacañang declared as legal non-working holiday.
So important is the Eid’l Adha to Muslims, for them much more significant than the Eid’l Fitr, the culmination of the month-long Ramadhan fasting season, where they abstain from food and drinks from dawn to dusk for one lunar cycle, about 28 to 29 days, as a religious obligation and atonement for wrongdoings.

The Eid’l Adha is commemorated yearly by Muslims to honor the biblical act of loyalty to God (Allah in Islam) by Abraham (Ibrahim in Arabic), chronicled both in the bible and in the Qur’an to have nearly slaughtered his son as an offering in a test of faith via divine instigation.The biblical and Qur’anic narration of the story concluded with Archangel Gabriel (Jibrael) preventing Abraham from slitting the throat of the child and offering instead a sacrificial ram from the wilderness.The Regional Police Office-ARMM has been guarding since Friday potential sites for open-field prayers in five towns in Sulu where Abu Sayyaf gunmen and government forces figured in more than 30 fierce gunfights in the past two weeks.Clerics in Sulu on Sunday said they are apprehensive of possible attacks by the Abu Sayyaf on Monday for two reasons, to disrupt the Eid’l Adha celebration by local residents and to avenge the deaths of more than 50 bandits killed by soldiers in recent encounters.