Attack in Turkey Leads Off 2017 [Updated]
[guest post by JVW]
Fox News is reporting that “an assailant” has opened fire on a nightclub in Istanbul, wounding several people. Michelle Malkin retweeted a Turkish journalist who reports witnesses claim that it was actually three assailants dressed as Santas who killed the security guards at the door and then began shooting up the club.
Acc to witnesses account to #Hurriyet: 3 attackers in Santa dresses raked the front of #Reina, killed guards then proceed into the club. pic.twitter.com/pFValNi0yH
— ilhan tanir (@WashingtonPoint) December 31, 2016
Stay tuned as we learn more about this horrible development.
Update: Fox has expanded their story (link above) to include some interesting details: they now acknowledge more than one Santa gunman, and they provide the interesting tidbit that Turkey had increased police presence over the holidays, including having undercover policemen dressed as Santas throughout Istanbul. This appears to have been a carefully laid-out plan by the gunmen.
Update II: Oh boy, this is bad: Fox now reports that there are at least 35 dead and 40 wounded in this attack. Just horrible.
Update III: It looks like we’re back to believing there was only one assailant who wrought all of this carnage.
Update IV: shipwreckedcrew alerts us to the news that twin bombs went off near Istanbul Stadium killing 38 and wounding 155. I’m going to go out on a limb and guess that this isn’t Russians.
– JVW
Islamists? Russian payback for the ambassador assassination (though that would be a weird choice for retaliation)?
JVW (6e49ce) — 12/31/2016 @ 4:12 pmSanta dresses?
papertiger (c8116c) — 12/31/2016 @ 4:16 pmMy bet is jihadis.
But my side bet is that either Gulen or the PKK will be blamed by the Turkish government.
Kishnevi (86e9bc) — 12/31/2016 @ 4:17 pmUpdate: Fox has expanded their story (link above) to include some interesting details: they now acknowledge more than one Santa gunman, and they provide the interesting tidbit that Turkey had increased police presence over the holidays, including having undercover policemen dressed as Santas throughout Istanbul. This appears to have been a carefully laid-out plan by the gunmen.
JVW (6e49ce) — 12/31/2016 @ 4:23 pmMSNBC and Fox are on it.
CNN… are on vacation. Such a joke of news network anymore.
DCSCA (797bc0) — 12/31/2016 @ 4:41 pmErdogan needs to rethink Turkey’s open borders policy.
nk (dbc370) — 12/31/2016 @ 4:44 pmUpdate II: Oh boy, this is bad: Fox now reports that there are at least 35 dead and 40 wounded in this attack. Just horrible.
JVW (6e49ce) — 12/31/2016 @ 5:06 pmMSNBC rolling coverage. Fox dipping in and out, CNN… live coverage of: muppets. Literally Times Square muppets. Such a joke of a network.
DCSCA (797bc0) — 12/31/2016 @ 5:36 pmI call it Rupert pumpkin because its a freakshow, so is MSNBC but its occasionally leavened by insight like that or Richard Engels.
narciso (d1f714) — 12/31/2016 @ 5:42 pmUpdate III: It looks like we’re back to believing there was only one assailant who wrought all of this carnage.
JVW (6e49ce) — 12/31/2016 @ 7:02 pmLet’s not jump to conclu…
…and, it’s Muslims.
Fred Z (b0a041) — 12/31/2016 @ 7:42 pmIts a huge place. 3500 inside.
shipwreckedcrew (56b591) — 12/31/2016 @ 8:11 pmNow it looks like two separate attacks in Istanbul.
The nightclub and also a twin car bombing by Istanbul Stadium, with 30+ more dead and 100+ wounded.
shipwreckedcrew (56b591) — 12/31/2016 @ 8:23 pmUpdate IV: shipwreckedcrew alerts us to the news that twin bombs went off near Istanbul Stadium killing 38 and wounding 155. I’m going to go out on a limb and guess that this isn’t Russians.
JVW (6e49ce) — 12/31/2016 @ 9:04 pmMethodists!
Cruz Supporter (102c9a) — 12/31/2016 @ 9:07 pmSo its like the November 2015 attacks in Paris, except they couldn’t get into the stadium then. I heard about it on the Latin channel and I thought thdh were mistaken
narciso (d1f714) — 12/31/2016 @ 9:09 pmThe stadium bombings were a few weeks ago.
Crimso (f98a88) — 1/1/2017 @ 6:44 amThe Turkish government imposed a news blackout shortly afetr it happened, under a provisioon of law that said reporting on it was supporting terrorism, and I don’t think there’s been much of an update on this.
This atack started at about 1:15 am Turkish time, and went on till maybe 1:45 am which would be around 6:15 or 6:45 pm Eastern Standard Time December 31, 2016 and 3:15 or 3:45 Pacific time.
This shows you that people who devise security plans don’t always ponder what happens if somebody shoots the security guard, which can happen by surprise.
There were warnings since at least December 22nd from the United States government and oters, and even a message from Baghdadi calling for attacks in Turkey.
Sammy Finkelman (d41c9f) — 1/1/2017 @ 10:59 amThere’s been a recent jail break in bRain, expect jay vee ranks to expand.
narciso (d1f714) — 1/1/2017 @ 11:09 amThe jihadists decided they wanted to begin 2017 with a bang!
Cruz Supporter (102c9a) — 1/1/2017 @ 11:13 amnarciso @19. How are they going to get to Syria or Iraq from Bahrain? Besides, wouldn’t hey be Shiites, and linked to Iran, if anything? Iran is at war wih the jay vee team. It’s the ranks maybe of the Iranian supported militia, in Iran or the Houthis in Yemen that might expand, except for the fact they are all local, and maybe not too many real terrorists in the jail anyway.
Sammy Finkelman (d41c9f) — 1/1/2017 @ 11:32 amSome are. Some are not, recall there is a minor prince of the klafas among the detainees as gitmo.
narciso (d1f714) — 1/1/2017 @ 11:36 amApproximately 600 people were in the nightclub. The Turkish Foreign Ministry said at least 39 people were killed, at least 15 of them foreigners, including citizens of Belgium, France, India, Israel, Jordan, Lebanon, Saudi Arabia and Tunisia. 69 people were hospitalized, and four of them
were in critical condition (but that doesn’t mean the lives of 65 are safe. I don’t know waht critical means, bt you can be in intensive care and not be in critical condition.
http://www.slate.com/articles/news_and_politics/explainer/2009/11/what_does_stable_condition_mean.html
It means maybe that vital signs are unstable, but theer’s no standard defintion.
Prime Minister Binali Yildirim denied 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” but theer was some video of someone wearing a Santa Claus hat
Turkey being both a Moslem and a (previously?) secular country, many things associated with Christmas have been moved to New Year’s. This is besides the fact that whatever Christians are there probably celebate their holidays according to the Julian calndar.
Sammy Finkelman (d41c9f) — 1/1/2017 @ 11:51 amCS… I say the West should give ’em more bang for their buck and pulverize Raqqah and any other stronghold.
Colonel Haiku (2601c0) — 1/1/2017 @ 12:19 pm10… had to be some elves too, JVW.
Colonel Haiku (2601c0) — 1/1/2017 @ 12:21 pmKhalifas thats what that house of westeros is.
narciso (d1f714) — 1/1/2017 @ 1:49 pmBut at least the police in Cologne adopted my recommendation of Straight-Outta-Compton/American Urban Policing this New Year. 2016 claimed my smartphone before it was done. A very happy New Year to Patterico land.
urbanleftbehind (847a06) — 1/1/2017 @ 6:45 pmKishnevi (86e9bc) — 12/31/2016 @ 4:17 pm
Not yet, maybe.
They don’t seem to be blaming anybody yet. There are just about no formal statements from the police, just leaks to favored newspapers. They released a picture and say they have identified him – or at least a name he used – but they aren’t releasing it. They found a tape of him somewhere taken by himself.
The terrorist arrived at the nightclub by taxi and took a taxi to go away but did not go into the address he had the second taxi drive to. He abandoned his weapon at or near the scene of the massacre and changed his clothes to white colors. he may not have been wearing a Santa uniform.
He did say Allah-hu Akbar. I’m not sure he also said he was acting at the orders of Baghdadi, but I think according to Baghdadi’s theology he may have to do both to avoid hell.
39 people were killed – they don’t seem to be raising the number – 24 of them citizens of countries other than Turkey, including one dual citizen. One was a 19-year old Israeli-Arab woman, one of a group of four women who traveled together.
One person’s life may have been saved by his cell phone, and by playing dead. His cell phone didn’t work after that and he only remembered the telephone number of his brother. He was shot in the leg and needed to be taken out on a stretcher. Some jumped into the Bosphurus including one part owner.
ISIS, or pseudo-ISIS claimed responsibility and said both that it was in revenege for urkish military intervention in Syria and that they attacked “where Christians were celebrating their pagan feast.” There’s been a whole campaign by Muslim clerics against moslems celebrationg the Gregorian calendar New Year in Turkey.
He came from the former Soviet-Union. there is picture said to be of him entering the country, but they seem to be leaking contradictory information. He, or his possible accomplices, were from East Turkestan, Afghanistan, Chechnya, an Uighur or tied to them, Uzbekistan and Turkmenistan, or Azerbaijan. He arrived in Istanbul on Nov. 20, and went to Konya on Nov. 22 after passing through Ankara.
Sammy Finkelman (643dcd) — 1/5/2017 @ 3:13 pm14. JVW (6e49ce) — 12/31/2016 @ 9:04 pm
I wouldn’t rule it out.
http://www.thedailybeast.com/articles/2017/01/04/vladimir-putin-s-newest-export-terrorists.html
Sammy Finkelman (643dcd) — 1/5/2017 @ 3:14 pmAnd apparently there will be twenty two more recruits, to the jayvees and varsity, from club gitmo
narciso (d1f714) — 1/5/2017 @ 3:21 pmRemember the fellow we were trying to get at when we got at awlakis kid, Al banna, guess where he is now?
narciso (d1f714) — 1/5/2017 @ 4:18 pm