‘Time of Reckoning’: Turkey Bombs Kurdish Targets in Retaliation for Istanbul Blast

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The bombing killed at least six members of the Syrian Democratic Forces and six Syrian soldiers, according to the same source.

Turkey launched airstrikes in areas of northern Syria controlled by Kurds, declaring that the “time of reckoning” had come after the terrorist attack in Istanbul last Sunday, November 13.

The airstrikes were launched even though a few days earlier the Kurdistan Workers’ Party (PKK) and the US-backed Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF) rejected Ankara’s accusation that they were behind the attack in Istiklal last Sunday, when six people died and 81 others were injured.

According to the Syrian Democratic Forces, the Turkish bombardments targeted their positions in the provinces of Aleppo (north) and Hasakah (northeast), mainly in the city of Kobani, a short distance from the border with Turkey.

“Kobani, the city that defeated Islamic State, is being bombarded by the Turkish air force and the Turkish occupation forces,” said Farhad Sami, a spokesman for the Kurdish-led SDF. He had categorically denied that the Kurds were behind the bombing in Istiklal.

There were more than twenty strikes by the Turkish military in the two provinces, according to the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights, a Britain-based NGO that relies on a wide network of sources in war-torn Syria.

The bombing killed at least six members of the Syrian Democratic Forces and six Syrian soldiers, according to the same source.

Kurdish organizations do not announce losses in their ranks.

But Mr. Sami confirmed that Turkish shelling also took place against facilities where Syrian regime forces are deployed in Raqqa and Hasakah (northeast) and Aleppo (north), citing dead and wounded.

The leader of the Syrian Democratic Forces, Mazloum Abdi, condemned the “aggressive and barbaric” Turkish shelling.

“The Turkish bombardment in our areas threatens the entire region. It does no one any good. We will do everything to avoid a major disaster. If war breaks out, the whole world will be eaten,” he said via Twitter.

Syrian state television confirmed that shelling had taken place.

The “time of reckoning”

The “time of reckoning” has come, Turkey’s Defense Minister Hulusi Akar said on Twitter over a photo showing a Turkish F-16 fighter jet taking off for a night operation.

“The scoundrels will be held accountable for their insidious attacks,” added Turkey’s defense minister.

“Terrorists’ nests are leveled with precision strikes,” he added in a second post, accompanied by a montage of the destruction of a target from the air, without specifying where it was.

The Turkish Ministry of Defense has so far not officially released any details about the ongoing operation.

Turkish authorities are accusing a young woman of Syrian nationality of planting the bomb that exploded last Sunday on the Istiklal boulevard in the heart of Istanbul.

Turkish authorities immediately blamed the Kurdistan Workers’ Party (PKK) and the People’s Protection Units (YPG), which Ankara says is the PKK’s “arm” in Syria.

Interior Minister Suleiman Soylou said that “the order for the attack was given in Kobani”.

The US State Department said on Friday it feared “possible military action by Turkey” in northern Syria and northern Iraq, urging Americans to avoid those two areas.

Syria, where a highly complex war has been raging since 2011, has been fragmented by the interventions of various organizations and foreign powers.

Between 2016 and 2019, the Turkish military launched three large-scale operations in northern Syria against Kurdish paramilitaries and other organizations.

Ankara, whose troops are present in several areas of northern Syria where they have established bases, has been threatening since May to launch a new large-scale attack against the SDF, which it describes as a “terrorist” organization.

The Turkish government says it intends to create a 30km wide “security zone” along its southern border.

RES-EMP

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