The Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant (ISIL) was “most probably” behind the triple suicide attack at Istanbul’s Atatürk Airport that killed 44 people, Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan has said, adding that they “belong in hell.”
“You
see what happened at the airport, and it was most probably Deash,”
Erdoğan said on July 1 at a ceremony in Istanbul, using an alternate
name for ISIL.
“They say they are doing this in the name of
Islam,” he added. “They have nothing to do with Islam. They belong in
hell. Whoever kills a soul, it is as if he has killed all of humanity.
The victims are sinless, children, women, the elderly… They are
traveling, unaware of what’s going on, and face death. No one has the
right to do that.”
At least 44 people, including 19 foreign
nationals, were killed and 239 others were injured when ISIL militants
attacked Istanbul’s Atatürk Airport late on June 28, first opening fire before detonating themselves.
Erdoğan said Turkey’s fight against terrorism would continue, while slamming the outlawed Kurdistan Workers’ Party (PKK) and the Peoples’ Democratic Party (HDP), without mentioning their names.
“Hopefully, we will end this [terrorism] sooner or later; peaceful days are near,” said the president. “They [the PKK
and the HDP] do not love my Kurdish brothers. On the contrary, they are
the enemy [of Kurds]. Now that their immunities have been lifted, they
will pay the price for what they have done.”
Meanwhile, Prime Minister Binali Yıldırım thanked the world for showing solidarity with Turkey in the wake of the terror attack.
“Many countries all across the world rushed to share our grief after the attack,” Yıldırım told reporters in Ankara before traveling to Hatay on the Syrian border.
“The
Turkish flag was flown in many places in Europe, flags were at
half-mast. I hope that this terror attack becomes a milestone for a
common fight against terrorism, without any double standards or ‘your
terrorist is bad, my terrorist is good’ rhetoric. We have long been
saying terrorism is a problem of all of humanity, not just Turkey. It is
good to see that this has been noticed, even if late.”
Yıldırım said the Turkish nation needed brotherhood and solidarity at difficult times, “which will soon be over.”