‘A symbolic attack against the heart of Turkey’
SCORES ARE DEAD AND MORE THAN 100 ARE INJURED AFTER SUICIDE BOMBERS OPEN FIRE THEN DETONATE EXPLOSIVES AT ISTANBUL’S INTERNATIONAL AIRPORT.
• Three attackers with suicide vests and guns killed scores of people Tuesday at the entrance to Istanbul’s Ataturk International Airport, the latest in a wave of violent attacks as the country battles Islamist terrorists and Kurdish separatists.
Turkish Prime Minister Binali Yildirim said 36 were dead and Justice Minister Bekir Bozdag said 147 were wounded. Another senior government official told The Associated Press the death toll could climb much higher.
Yildirim said the investigation indicated the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant was behind the attack. “What is noteworthy is that this attack came at a time when our country is putting up a merciless fight against separatist terrorism and recording significant success.”
Turkish officials s aid three terrorists took part in the attack near the security checkpoints at the entrance to Ataturk Airport’s arrivals hall. It is believed the terrorists began shooting at people and then blew themselves up as police returned fire.
Hundreds of passengers flooded out of the busy airport, which serves as a connecting point for many international flights. Eyewitnesses recounted pools of blood and several loud bangs. Some passengers hid under counters and in a basement cafeteria as chaos unfurled over their heads.
“First I heard the gunfire, then the explosions. Two of them,” said Koray Arslan, who was at the nearby domestic terminal. “They were very powerful. I could feel the tremors under my feet.”
The majority of the casualties were Turkish citizens, “but there are foreign nationals” both killed and wounded, a Turkish official said.
The attack was “yet another reminder, as if any was needed, that Turkey faces the perfect storm of terrorist threats,” Anthony Skinner, a director with U. K.- based forecasting company Verisk Maplecroft, said. The spread of violence in Turkey is scaring off tourists. Last month saw the biggest slump in visitor numbers on record.
Turkey has been hit by spillover f rom t he civil war in neighbouring Syria, where ISIL controls territory along the Turkish border and the army is also fighting an escalating war with separatist Kurdish rebels.
Turkey is a member of the U. S.- led coalition against I SIL. Last July, Turkey launched airstrikes against ISIL targets that killed upwards of 35 terrorists. In January an ISIL suicide bomber killed 12 people when he detonated himself in Istanbul. In March, another suicide bomber killed four people, again in Istanbul.
If the group was behind Tuesday’s attack, “this would represent a significant escalation by the Islamic State toward Turkey,” said Soner Cagaptay, director of the Turkish Research Program at the Washington Institute for Near East Policy. The attack would likely draw Turkey further into a conflict with the jihadist group.
“This is a symbolic attack against the heart of Turkey,” he said.
President Recep Tayyip Erdogan said in a statement the Istanbul airport attack was an effort to hurt Turkey’s image. “For the terrorist organizations, there’s no difference between Istanbul and London, Ankara and Berlin, Izmir and Chicago, Antalya and Rome,” he said.
The attack is the latest to target airports and the aviation industry in the Middle East and Europe, coming three months after suicide bombers struck Brussels airport. It serves as reminder of the vulnerability of airport lobbies and other public places where large numbers of people congregate, said Hans Weber, an aviation consultant in San Diego.
“The probability of copycat attacks goes way up high after one of those attacks,” said Weber, who advised the U. S. federal government on airport security issues following the Sept. 11 attacks. “From a terrorist perspective, Brussels was a success. You can see how they would be motivated to copy that.”
In March, ISIL explosions at Brussels Airport and a metro station killed 32 people.
In May, the possibility of an attack against Turkey by ISIL, also called ISIS, was raised by the Institute for the Study of War think tank in a report: ISIS Forecast: Ramadan 2016.
‘ The next forty- five days constitute a high- risk period for a surge of attacks by ISIS during the Islamic holy month of Ramadan. ISIS traditionally uses Ramadan — which begins on June 6 and ends on July 5, 2016 — as a justification for its attacks and as an occasion to reorient its strategy. This year, ISIS will likely take action to reverse serious losses in Iraq and Syria,” the report said, saying Turkey, Lebanon and Jordan were particularly vulnerable.
Prime Minister Justin Trudeau said on Twitter that Canada “strongly comdemns tonight’s deadly attack in Turkey.”
Trudeau said his “thoughts and prayers” are with the victims as “we stand with our allies against terrorism.”