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Turkey, a Conduit for Fighters Joining ISIS, Begins to Feel Its Wrath
The New York Times ^ | 29 June 2016 | Rukmini Callimachi

Posted on 06/30/2016 12:21:56 AM PDT by Cronos

When the bodies of Islamic State fighters are recovered on the Syrian battlefield, the passports found on them have often been stamped in Turkey, which thousands of recruits pass through on their way to join the terror group.

Fighters who call relatives abroad often do so using Turkish cellphone numbers, and when they need cash, they head to Western Union offices in southern Turkey, according to court and intelligence documents.

From the start of the Islamic State’s rise through the chaos of the Syrian war, Turkey has played a central, if complicated, role in the group’s story. For years, it served as a rear base, transit hub and shopping bazaar for the Islamic State, and at first, that may have protected Turkey from the violence the group has inflicted elsewhere.

Now, the Turkish government and Western officials say the suicide bombings at Istanbul’s main airport on Tuesday bore the hallmarks of an Islamic State attack, and they have added them to a growing roll call of assaults attributed to the group in Turkey in recent months.

...“Where Turkey can be accused of negligence is failing to understand, just as Pakistan did with the Taliban, that these radicals who crossed Turkey to get into Syria would morph into an organization that not only threatened the West, but ultimately itself,” Mr. Aliriza said. “The threat assessment simply did not happen fast enough.”

(Excerpt) Read more at nytimes.com ...


TOPICS: Foreign Affairs; War on Terror
KEYWORDS: isis; turkey
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Turkey is on its way (thanks to Erdogan) to becoming a new Pakistan. This is a horrifying thought -- I hope the secularists in Turkey stop this.
1 posted on 06/30/2016 12:21:56 AM PDT by Cronos
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To: Cronos

Sow the wind, reap the whirlwind


2 posted on 06/30/2016 12:35:49 AM PDT by coydog (Time to feed the pigs!)
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To: Cronos
Last year, Turkey allowed over 1 million "migrants" to pass through its teritory on the way to Europe...

And is still demanding to be let into the EU...

3 posted on 06/30/2016 12:36:36 AM PDT by Cowboy Bob
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To: Cronos
"By 2015, the group was advising recruits to book round-trip tickets to beach resorts in southern Turkey instead, and to be sure to spend a few days pretending to be a tourist as a ruse."

"That was the technique used by Reda Hame, a 29-year-old Parisian recruit........ “I bought an all-inclusive holiday so that I could pass myself off as a tourist,” he said, according to a transcript of his interrogation by France’s domestic intelligence agency in August."

4 posted on 06/30/2016 12:37:24 AM PDT by Mr Apple ( HILLARY CLINTON >>> COOKIES, CANDIES, CAKE, DESSERTS & CASHEWS....the WALRUS LOOK)
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To: Cronos

If the Turks had a brain cell in their collective population they would never have put this POS into power in the first place.

Then again, one could say the same thing regarding the American electorate...


5 posted on 06/30/2016 12:44:32 AM PDT by Netz
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To: Cronos

The Kurds may get their own nation out of this.


6 posted on 06/30/2016 2:42:37 AM PDT by Ken H (Best election ever!)
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To: coydog
Sow the wind, reap the whirlwind

Islam is Islam. Democracy is the train we ride to our ultimate victory.

-- Recep Tayyip Erdoğan; 12th President of Turkey


7 posted on 06/30/2016 3:04:58 AM PDT by Iron Munro (If Illegals Were Rebublicans 50 Million Democrats Would Be Screaming "Build The Wall!")
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To: Netz

well, the Islamist AKP has won 35%, 45% and 49% of the vote in the previous elections


8 posted on 06/30/2016 3:17:33 AM PDT by Cronos (Obama's dislike of Assad is not based on his brutality but that he isn't a jihadi Moslem)
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To: Cronos

Russia will make these ISIS fighters pay with their lives when they cross the border into Syria.


9 posted on 06/30/2016 3:24:29 AM PDT by TYVets
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To: Cronos

It seems to me no one is mentioning the agreement between Turkey and Israel made just before the airport attack. Is that because no one wants to try to read the “minds” of ISIS terrorists? Or is there some other reason why the media would ignore the fact that ISIS just attacked the country of fellow Muslims? Or did I miss something?

I know there are some things the media just ignores, like boycotts of various corporations.


10 posted on 06/30/2016 3:37:54 AM PDT by firebrand
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To: Cronos

Muslim Brotherhood reproductive cycle...


11 posted on 06/30/2016 3:59:28 AM PDT by Netz
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To: Cronos

The Syerian debacle started with the socalled “Arab Spring.” Recall how liberals everywhere danced in the streets. With just a little push all of those horrible western oriented or neutral dictators would collapse and be replaced by...be replaced by...Does anyone remember who was supposed to replace the horrible western oriented dictators? I remember somebody was pushing for a college professor someplace to be the new...elected? Do middle eastern countries have elections? Because, when the do they tend to elect people like Hamas. What, exactly was this wonderful Arab spring that Obama pushed the CIA to create supposed to do again?


12 posted on 06/30/2016 4:25:15 AM PDT by Gen.Blather (`)
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To: Cronos

Though they are attacking Turks now, its good to remember that ISIS is a Turk brainchild, the war in Syria is a Turk creation, that Turkey is ISIS’s safe rear-zone, it where they are supplied, its where their soldiers come through, its where they sell their oil (and specifically, to Erdogan’s son).

And that he has had State Department support all along. It was only once the PR problem became unbearable that Obama had to launch his pin-prick war and even at that he has done everything he can to protect ISIS.

So why would ISIS attack Turkey? Its like the joke about the scorpion. “I’m a scorpion, its what I do”. Islam is the only religion that the deeper you go, the more homicidal you become. If they can get to you, they would prefer to kill you. If they can’t, they’ll make do killing each other.


13 posted on 06/30/2016 4:39:05 AM PDT by marron
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To: Gen.Blather
The Syrian and Libyan "springs" were actually winters. Ditto for the Yemen "Spring" -- these three countries are hell-holes now.

And this is clearly Obama + Hollande + Cameron's fault -- these three aided the jihadis fighting the regimes

14 posted on 06/30/2016 4:48:26 AM PDT by Cronos (Obama's dislike of Assad is not based on his brutality but that he isn't a jihadi Moslem)
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To: Gen.Blather

The only middle eastern countries that have regular elections are: Israel, Turkey and Iran. None of these is Arabized


15 posted on 06/30/2016 4:49:16 AM PDT by Cronos (Obama's dislike of Assad is not based on his brutality but that he isn't a jihadi Moslem)
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To: marron

Quite correct — the Islamic state is the Turk’s brainchild, but the natural child of Saudi Arabia and Qatar (Wahabbi sunni jihadi states). These three Sunni powers wanted to kill the Shia, the Christians and the Alawites and Druze in Iraq and Syria.


16 posted on 06/30/2016 4:55:19 AM PDT by Cronos (Obama's dislike of Assad is not based on his brutality but that he isn't a jihadi Moslem)
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To: Cronos

“Ditto for the Yemen “Spring” — these three countries are hell-holes now.”

It has been a while but I think Yemen was the country under discussion. There were riots going on there and I listened to the talking heads rhapsodizing about how wonderful things would be once the ruling party stepped down. Stepped down. Somebody suggested a name of who they thought would be a good leader, some professor, I think. My mind boggled at the talking head’s apparent lack of understanding about political dynamics, power bases, finances, and everything involved in setting up a government. And, what of the people rioting in the streets? Apparently that would stop and everything would go back to normal and be milk and honey once the existing government went away. It’s hard to breath when you witness such stupidity.

It is apparent that in one form or another our government, Britain’s government and the French elites all bought into this sandcastles-in-the-air sentiment.


17 posted on 06/30/2016 5:02:43 AM PDT by Gen.Blather (`)
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To: Gen.Blather
Exactly -- I see the same thing happening in the Central african republic now, where westerners are telling the Christians to "just get along with their moslem neighbors" -- forgetting that they (the Christians) did that for decades, but when the moslem Salaka rebels took control, the MOslem neighbors turned on their Christian neighbors.

Does no one follow Sun-Tzu (understand the land, the way etc. first)??

18 posted on 06/30/2016 6:52:37 AM PDT by Cronos (Obama's dislike of Assad is not based on his brutality but that he isn't a jihadi Moslem)
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To: Cronos

“Does no one follow Sun-Tzu (understand the land, the way etc. first)?? “

In the new Common Core curriculum Sun-Tzu has been replaced by Tinkerbell. All you have to do is believe.


19 posted on 06/30/2016 7:03:34 AM PDT by Gen.Blather (`)
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To: Gen.Blather

democracy and freedom were blooming. The elites could not abide by that. The elites supported Iran suppressing their people. The elites supported extremists to take control back, They sent guns and weapons and turned their heads to atrocities.


20 posted on 06/30/2016 7:34:32 AM PDT by Homer1
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