Horror upon horror in Turkey

Child bomber killed 51 wedding guest in Gazientap on August 21

The attack on a wedding party that left 50 dead and over 70 injured in the Turkish city of Gazientap on August 21 had an added layer of horror. The suicide bomber was quickly identified as being a child aged between 12 and 14 years. It is not the first time a child has been so used and there are other instances across the Middle East in the last five years — but they are rare. This was the tenth attack in a year in Turkey. The Islamic State (IS) has been blamed for six, including this most recent one (IS has not historically claimed a Turkish attack), the Kurdish PKK one, and its offshoot, the TAK a further three. It is abundantly clear that the Turkish security agencies are far from being on top of the terrorism problem, and have in all likelihood been weakened by the purge that has followed the recent coup attempt.

If this was an IS attack, then there is some speculation that it is ‘revenge’ for losses it has suffered, in particular the retaking, in part by American-supported Kurdish irregulars, of the city of Manbij. The wedding was attended mostly by Kurds, there has been an IS presence in Gaziantep for at least a year and it is 64km from the Syrian border. It could not have been entirely unexpected. Attacks on weddings in Turkey are virtually unheard of, and whoever carried out this attack will be seeking to widen social, ethnic and sectarian fault lines, to sow unease and mistrust in a population already deeply unsettled and polarised.

President Erdogan is beset on all sides despite having widespread public support — even more so since the failed coup attempt — and the image of a Muslim-majority country at peace and ease with itself of six years ago, shattered. Turkey’s chances of ever joining the European Union, a long-cherished dream, are today virtually nil. The dissatisfaction and unease that was parent to the failed coup has not gone away nor will it any time soon. And sadly the transformation of happiness into misery and grief at Gazientap will not be the last such event.

Published in The Express Tribune, August 23^rd, 2016.

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