A blast tore through a wedding celebration late on Saturday in southeastern Turkey, killing at least 51 people and wounding 69 others, 17 of whom are in critical condition. President Recep Tayyip Erdogan immediately blamed ISIS for what was the country’s deadliest bombing this year, saying the suicide attacker was a child aged between 12 and 14. The bombing took place in a narrow street in the city of Gaziantep, located around 25 miles from the Syrian border, where people had gathered to take part in a Kurdish street wedding.
Witnesses spoke of the horrific scene of devastation where just moments earlier there had been jubilation and dancing. “When we went back to see what had happened, everyone was on the floor, and there were body parts scattered everywhere and blood splattered on the walls,” a local man tells the New York Times. Local journalist Naziım Daştan tells the Guardian: “There were so many dead people. There were body parts.” The bride and groom are in the hospital but their condition is not life-threatening.
The pro-Kurdish People’s Democratic Party (HDP) said the wedding had been for one of its members and “many citizens, including women and children, lost their lives.” By all accounts the death toll could have been significantly higher considering the attack took place after some families had already left.
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Turkey has been hit by numerous deadly attacks over the past year, several of which have been blamed on ISIS. In June, a suspected ISIS attack at Istanbul’s main airport killed 44 people while in October, 103 people were killed by dual suicide bombers at a peace rally in Ankara, the country’s capital. In addition to the bombings, Turkey is still reeling from an alleged failed coup last month that left at least 240 people dead, which the government has blamed on U.S.–based Islamist preacher Fethullah Gulen. He denies the accusation. Erdogan said there is no difference between ISIS, Kurdish separatist rebels, and Gulen’s supporters, characterizing them all as “bloodthirsty organizations.”
If this indeed was the work of ISIS, it comes at a time when the extremist group has lost a lot of ground in northern Syria, and “there will be speculation it was a revenge attack, intended as a show of strength by a group on the defensive,” notes the BBC’s Mark Lowen.
