The Catholic Bishops’ Conference of the Philippines (CBCP) was allegedly saddened over the death of 18 rebels after the Philippine military conducted an airstrike in Burgos, Isabela on Saturday night, November 25.
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But the sources of the story being Okd2 and localhero.altervista.org made it suspicious. True enough, when we checked, Okd2’s story was marked as “satire.” However, the story has already spread on Facebook after it was shared thousands of times.
It was also shared by individuals to Facebook groups and Facebook fan pages, such as “President Rodrigo Duterte.” “(vf)DDS/DIEHARD DUTERTE SUPPORTERS,” “Unofficial: PNP Chief Ronald “Bato” Dela Rosa,” “Team Duterte for Federalism,” “Marcos Defenders Worldwide Unlimited,” and “Bongbong Marcos United.”
As what was mentioned before, the story “CBCP Saddened By Army Airstrike that Killed 18 Rebels” originated from Okd2 as a ‘satirical’ article but the disclaimer did not appear when it was copied by another blog, localhero.altervista.org.
CBCP President Archbishop Socrates Villegas allegedly called the airstrike “inhumane” and “unfair” and was quoted saying: “Natutulog yong mga tao tapos bobombahin mo? Anong klaseng animal ang gumagawa noon?”
Villegas allegedly slammed how the military killed the rebels like pigs since they were attacked when they could not defend themselves.
Okd2 noted how CBCP has criticized Duterte’s war on drugs and now, they even hit the government for fighting the rebels.
But Villegas’ quoted statement can only be found on Okd2’s story.
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We also found out that the military airstrike that was conducted in Isabela that Okd2 mentioned was actually based on their own ‘satirical’ story, “AFP to Use Israeli-Made Drones on NPA Camp Airstrike,” published on November 25. This was followed up by another ‘satirical’ feature, “Just In: 18 NPA Killed, 23 Wounded in Latest Isabela Airstrike,” which claimed that the airstrike killed 18 NPA rebels and wounded 23 more.
Aside from the ‘satire’ tags on both stories, most of the details in both stories were made up.
The Okd2 stories claimed that the PH Army conducted an airstrike on NPA camps in Burgos in Isabel on November 25, but we could not find other reports from credible sources confirming such military operation.
We also could not credible reports mentioning the military officers who were named in the Okd2 story, making us believe that those names were also made up for the ‘satirical’ purpose of the story. They mentioned “Lt/Gen. Carmelito Santander, Chief of Army Strategic Command” and “Major General Artemio Española, head of the 11th IB.”
Española was even quoted saying, “This will serve as warning to the NPA. The military is serious in destroying the rebels and if they don’t want to surrender, being killed is their only option.” However, we only found the statement on the same satirical story from Okd2.
Since there was no airstrike, there were no dead rebels in Isabela whom Archbishop Villegas sympathized with. It only took typing a few keywords on Google’s search bar to trace the source of the story and find out that it was meant to be ‘satirical,’ hence it should not be taken seriously.
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