Suspects linked to ISIS planned attacks against pope, were thwarted by online boasts: officials

Suspects linked to ISIS plotted to attack Pope Francis during his trip to Indonesia — but were thwarted by their own online boasts, authorities say.

Indonesian national police arrested seven people suspected of planning attacks against the 87-year-old, peace-preaching pontiff while he was in Jakarta as part of his Asia-Pacific tour, officials say.

Police seized bows and arrows, a drone and ISIS leaflets during raids of the suspects’ homes Sept. 2 and 3, police said in a statement last week. 

At least some of the plotters had “pledged allegiance to ISIS,” an unnamed source told the Straits Times. One of them was in the same ISIS-aligned terror cell that stabbed Indonesia’s chief security minister in 2019.

It remains unclear if all seven detainees were working together, police said.

The wannabe attackers were apparently enraged over the pope’s visit to the largest mosque in Southeast Asia, Istiqlal, and the fact that the government urged local television stations not to interrupt the pope’s televised Mass with the usual Islamic call to prayer, the Straits Times reported.

The plotters seemed to have outed themselves online and been sold out by acquaintances. Police said the suspects blasted threats and propaganda on social media in the run-up to the pontiff’s visit. They also threatened to start fires at certain locations.

“We have a mechanism to monitor and filter. We had tip-off information from members of the public,”  said Col. Aswin Siregar of the national police anti-terror unit Detachment 88.

The pope had delivered a message of peace and tolerance during his visit to Jakarta, the first stop on a 12-day Asia-Pacific tour that also includes Papua New Guinea, East Timor and Singapore.

Indonesian authorities ramped up protection for Il Papa during his three-day visit, which ended Friday: On top of his own security detail, the pope was protected by Indonesian police, snipers and soldiers — a total force of around 4,000, Barron’s reported. 

The protection level had precedent in Indonesia, which has the largest Muslim population in the world and a history of Islamic terror, including a 2021 suicide bombing of a Catholic cathedral in the city of Makassar that injured 20 people. 

The previous year, another attack against Christians on the island of Sulawesi left four people dead, including two who were beheaded.

The force that uncovered the plot against Pope Francis, Detachment 88, has gained a reputation for swift action against terrorists.

A few weeks before foiling the plot against the pope, the group nabbed Yudi Lukito Kurniawan, an al Qaeda-affiliated terrorist who plotted an attack on the Singapore Stock Exchange building.