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Terrorist Attack at Istanbul Nightclub Kills Dozens Nightclub Massacre in Istanbul Exposes Turkey’s Deepening Fault Lines
(about 3 hours later)
ISTANBUL — Turkish officials have begun a nationwide manhunt for a gunman who killed at least 39 New Year’s revelers at an Istanbul nightclub early Sunday morning before escaping. ISTANBUL — When a lone gunman murdered dozens of New Year’s revelers early Sunday, he targeted a symbol of a cosmopolitan Istanbul that is increasingly under threat: a dazzling nightclub where people from around the world could party together, free from the mayhem and violence gripping the region.
The target of the attack was the Reina nightclub, which had maintained its popularity with a mostly affluent, cosmopolitan clientele despite a series of terrorist attacks that had severely crimped Turkey’s tourism industry. Popular among professional soccer players and soap opera stars, and with Turks and foreigners alike, the nightclub overlooking the Bosporus is known for its late-night parties and the beautiful view from its terrace. It was there, at the Reina nightclub on the Bosporus — a hot spot for soap opera stars and professional athletes, Turks and well-heeled tourists — that those hoping to move past a particularly troubled year died together.
As many as 600 people were estimated to have been in the club when the attacker, a lone gunman, burst in around 1:15 a.m. and opened fire. The assault was the second in two weeks in Turkey, and it further exposed the fault lines in a country that is increasingly tearing apart amid terrorist attacks and political instability.
At least 24 of the people killed were foreigners, according to the semiofficial Anadolu news agency. They included citizens of Belgium, France, India, Iraq, Israel, Jordan, Lebanon, Libya, Saudi Arabia and Tunisia, according to news agencies and government statements. Sixty-nine people were hospitalized, four in critical condition. With the gunman still on the loose Sunday night and a nationwide manhunt underway, the killings brutally highlighted a dilemma for Turkey’s authoritarian president, Recep Tayyip Erdogan: Even though he has cracked down on opponents and put in place security measures to bring stability to his rattled country, the attacks keep mounting.
No one had claimed responsibility for the mass shooting, which came as threats against Turkey by the Islamic State and its supporters have increased. It was the fourth terrorist attack in Turkey in less than a month. “I don’t know what to say,” said Zeynep Ozman, whose brother, Ali, was wounded in the attack. “I don’t want to say anything political, but this can’t be accepted as the new norm. Terrorism is everywhere now, and the government has no control. Something needs to be done. There is no life left in Istanbul.”
Prime Minister Binali Yildirim told reporters that the authorities did not yet have hard evidence on who was behind the attack. “Some details have started emerging, but the authorities are working towards a concrete result,” he said. He denied widespread accounts that the gunman might have been dressed in a Santa Claus outfit, saying: “There is no truth to this. He is an armed terrorist as we know it.” Turkey has been reeling for several years now, as it has been increasingly drawn into the Syrian civil war. By opening its borders to foreign fighters trying to reach Syria, critics say, it inadvertently supported the rise of the Islamic State, which is now carrying out attacks within Turkey. Then, in 2015, a stalled war with Kurdish militants was renewed, and this summer, Turkey suffered from an attempted coup.
But a senior United States official said on Sunday that the emerging assessment of both American and Turkish authorities was that the Islamic State was responsible for the attack or at least inspired the gunman who went on the shooting rampage. The attack on Sunday morning — a strike on the Western, urbane face of Istanbul — is likely to further diminish Turkey’s democracy by giving Mr. Erdogan a freer hand to expand his crackdown on opponents, which accelerated after the coup attempt. It is also likely to erode the country’s economy, which has already suffered because of a decline in tourism and foreign investment.
President Recep Tayyip Erdogan of Turkey said that terrorists were trying to break the will of the people. “Nothing that the government is doing is helping make Turkey more secure,” said Asli Aydintasbas, a prominent Turkish writer and a fellow at the European Council on Foreign Relations. “The crackdown on domestic dissidents is further destabilizing the country, and when it is not destabilizing, it is increasing the dangerous polarization here.”
“They are working to destroy our country’s morale and create chaos by deliberately targeting our nation’s peace and targeting civilians with these heinous attacks,” he said in a statement. “We will retain our coolheadedness as a nation, standing more closely together, and we will never give ground to such dirty games.” On Sunday, Mr. Erdogan vowed in a statement that the fight against terrorists would bring the country together.
He added, “Turkey is determined to continue to fight to the end against terror and to do whatever is necessary to ensure the security of its citizens and secure peace in the region.” “They are working to destroy our country’s morale and create chaos by deliberately targeting our nation’s peace and targeting civilians with these heinous attacks,” he said. “We will retain our coolheadedness as a nation, standing more closely together, and we will never give ground to such dirty games.”
Gov. Vasip Sahin of Istanbul Province said a police officer outside the club had been killed before the bloodshed began inside. As it had after other recent attacks, the government imposed a news blackout, saying news outlets should report only official statements.
“One person first kills the police officer outside, and then a civilian,” Mr. Sahin said. “Inside, he rained bullets brutally, mercilessly over innocent people who were there just to celebrate the New Year and have fun.” No group claimed responsibility for the attack, which killed at least 39 people, including at least 25 foreigners, according to Turkey’s state news agency. But threats against Turkey from the Islamic State and its supporters have increased, and a senior United States official said on Sunday that the emerging assessment of both the American and Turkish authorities was that the Islamic State was responsible for the attack, or had at least inspired the gunman.
In the ensuing panic and the rush to escape, some clubgoers jumped into the Bosporus — which separates Europe and Asia — and others hunkered down for safety. Still, the Islamic State, which Turkey is fighting against in Syria, is just one of many threats the country faces.
Sinem Uyanik, who was there with her husband, Lutfu Uyanik, told The Associated Press that she had seen several bodies inside the club. Her husband was wounded, she added, but not seriously. Even before the Arab Spring revolutions six years ago, Turkey sought to set itself apart and shape events around the region with its so-called zero problems with neighbors foreign policy.
“Before I could understand what was happening, my husband fell on top me,” she said. “I had to lift several bodies from on top of me before I could get out.” Now, all that has changed. Turkey, a member of NATO, has been engulfed by the dark and destabilizing forces gripping the Middle East and the surrounding regions, where everything seems to converge: terrorism, the migrant crisis, the rise of authoritarianism.
A wounded man on a stretcher told the independent Turkish news agency DHA that the attacker had “put a bullet to the head of anyone alive.” The renewal of a long war between the Turkish government and ethnic Kurdish militants has left cities in the Kurdish-dominated southeast in rubble and brought terror to the heart of Turkey’s cities. A bombing at a soccer stadium in Istanbul in December that killed dozens was just the latest attack claimed by a Kurdish terrorist group.
Television footage showed dozens of ambulances rushing to the scene and people fleeing, some walking with difficulty, arm in arm. The government pinned last summer’s failed coup on the followers of a rival to Mr. Erdogan, the Muslim preacher Fethullah Gulen, who lives in exile in Pennsylvania. That was followed by a countercoup engineered by Mr. Erdogan, in which tens of thousands of people he said were linked to Mr. Gulen — police officers, soldiers, teachers, civil servants and others — were either arrested or purged from their jobs.
The owner of Reina, Mehmet Kocarslan, told the Hurriyet news site that security measures had been increased over the past 10 days after American intelligence officials had warned about an attack in Turkey over the holidays. And less than two weeks before Sunday’s attack, an off-duty police officer assassinated the Russian ambassador to Turkey at an art gallery in Ankara, saying he was exacting revenge for Russia’s role in bombing civilians in the northern Syrian city of Aleppo. The killing came amid a rapprochement between Turkey and Russia, which had indicated that Mr. Erdogan, instead of continuing to push for the ouster of President Bashar al-Assad of Syria, was now leaning on Russia, Mr. Assad’s most important ally, to bring peace to Syria.
Emre Eytan Can, 34, an investment banker from Istanbul, said the Reina was a go-to weekend destination, especially in the summer. The assassination and the deadly nightclub attack have raised questions about how able Turkey’s intelligence forces are to keep the country safe.
“It’s open air, on the water, and it’s central enough for everyone to get to easily,” he said. “People can pull up by car or boat.” With such a harrowing year coming to a close, many Turks were eager for New Year’s Eve, as if turning the page on the calendar might signal a fresh start.
He said he had always loved going there, and added: “It’s a carefree place, and even in this environment, I would never imagine a terrorist attack taking place there because of security. But I guess it is a target because it’s full of high-class Turks and foreigners. And it’s a place where people let their hair down and drink, which is not in line with Islam.” In Istanbul, where a video on social media before the shooting showed well-dressed partyers at Reina ringing in the new year with sparklers, Champagne and confetti, the gaiety lasted just a little over an hour.
The shooting came days after the Nashir Media Foundation, a group identified by experts as supporting the Islamic State, published the last of three messages calling on individual attackers in the West to turn the holiday season into days of “terror and blood.” It urged attacks on clubs, markets and movie theaters. Around 1:15 a.m., the gunman, armed with a rapid-fire rifle, killed a police officer guarding the club before going on a shooting rampage. In the ensuing panic, some clubgoers jumped into the Bosporus, which separates Europe from Asia. It was unclear if anyone had drowned in the frigid waters.
Nashir Media singled out Turkey in its threats. “Attack the embassies and consulates of Turkey and all coalition countries where you are,” the message said. “Turn their happiness and joy into grieves,” it went on in garbled English, “and their feasts into funerals.” Ms. Ozman, who visited her wounded brother in the hospital, said: “He was covered in blood. I barely recognized him at first. He is in complete shock.”
In addition, there have been numerous official threats by the Islamic State, including from its leader, Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi, who in his most recent speech called for attacks against Turkey. She said her brother had told her that when the shooting started, he threw himself on the floor and felt things falling on him: bodies, tables, glass. She said he might have been saved by bodies that acted as shields against further shots.
On Dec. 22, the United States government said in a statement that extremist groups were “continuing aggressive efforts to conduct attacks throughout Turkey” in areas where American citizens and expatriates lived or visited. The statement urged caution about being in crowded places and public gatherings during the holidays. The gunman’s identity and motives remain unclear, but one witness said he had heard the man shout “God is great” in Arabic.
A White House official said President Obama had been briefed by his national security advisers about the nightclub attack. Mr. Obama expressed his condolences and offered assistance to the Turkish authorities. Even with so much uncertain, the attack on Reina, which is perhaps Istanbul’s most famous nightclub, seemed to symbolize one of Turkish society’s deepest divides, between the secular and the pious — a fissure that has grown deeper under Mr. Erdogan, an Islamist who has expanded religious schooling and sought to restrict alcohol sales.
“We stand in solidarity with our NATO ally Turkey in combating the ongoing threat of terrorism,” Mark C. Toner, the deputy spokesman for the State Department, said in a statement. Some on social media were quick to point out the rhetoric against New Year’s celebrations that had come from Islamist corners of Turkey. A recent Friday sermon prepared by the government’s religious authority said that New Year’s revelry belonged to “other cultures and other worlds.”
The attack drew condemnation from world leaders. Another passage of the sermon read, “We shall not forget that it is never suitable for a believer to forget himself and his aim of creation after a year passes from the stock of life, to exhibit illicit manners and behaviors that don’t comply with our values.”
Pope Francis prayed for the victims in the attack, for those injured and for “the whole nation in mourning” during his weekly address on Sunday at St. Peter’s Square in Vatican City. Expressing his “closeness to the Turkish people,” the pope asked “the Lord to support all people of good will who roll up their sleeves to boldly tackle the scourge of terrorism and this stain of blood that envelops the world with a shadow of fear and bewilderment.” In the aftermath of the attack, Prof. Howard Eissenstat, an expert on Turkey at St. Lawrence University, wrote on Twitter: “Disturbing + not very difficult line to draw between official Turkish anti New Years campaign + tonight’s violence. Rhetoric has consequences.”
Turkey is still dealing with the aftershocks of a coup attempt that began July 15, in which at least 265 people were killed. Emre Eytan Can, 34, an investment banker from Istanbul, said he was a regular at Reina, although he was not there on New Year’s Eve.
Though the effort sputtered in a matter of hours, Mr. Erdogan responded with a crackdown targeting dissidents across Turkish society. In addition to arresting thousands of military personnel suspected of involvement in the coup, hundreds of thousands of civil servants, educational workers and journalists have been suspended. “I guess it is a target because it’s full of high-class Turks and foreigners,” he said. “And it’s a place where people let their hair down and drink, which is not in line with Islam.”
The coup and the assassination of Ambassador Andrey G. Karlov of Russia in Ankara on Dec. 19 raised concerns that the country’s security establishment has grown ineffective. The internal turmoil also raised doubts about how well Turkey can participate in international counterterrorism efforts, especially against the Islamic State. Turkey’s troubles had already led to a sharp decline in Western tourists, but visitors from the Middle East, perhaps because they are accustomed to terrorist threats at home, have kept coming. News of the attack quickly reverberated around the region, with citizens of Israel, Jordan, Lebanon, Saudi Arabia and Tunisia among the victims, along with people from Belgium, France and India.
By Sunday afternoon, the by-now familiar rituals of grief that follow terrorist attacks were in full swing, with consulate officials and grieving families converging at an Istanbul morgue, where local officials had set up tea stands outside in the bitter cold.
A Lebanese woman, Stephanie Deek, was there with her husband to identify a friend from Lebanon, Haykal, a newlywed who had been celebrating the holiday in Istanbul with his wife.
The wife was safe, but Haykal, who had jumped into the Bosporus to escape the killer, was dead.
“I am so sad,” Ms. Deek said. “I cannot describe how I feel. I did not expect to find him here. I thought he was just missing.”