ISIS Blamed in Istanbul Attack That Kills 10 Tourists
By CEYLAN YEGINSU and TIM ARANGO

ISTANBUL — On any given day, the heart of this city’s historic district, where the monuments of three empires — Roman, Byzantine and Ottoman — collide with a mix of majesty and tranquillity, is a bustling center of tourism, one of the world’s most visited places.

Mixing among German tourists on Tuesday morning, not far from the celebrated Blue Mosque, the authorities said, was an Islamic State operative from Syria in his late 20s, wearing a vest of explosives and determined to kill as many people as possible.

The attack left 10 tourists dead, all foreigners, and like other terrorist strikes in recent months in Paris; Beirut, Lebanon; Mali; Egypt; and Baghdad, it resonated far beyond Turkey as civilians were again cut down while going about their daily lives.

“Today, Istanbul was hit,” said Angela Merkel, the German chancellor, in a statement. “Paris has been hit. Tunisia has been hit. Ankara has been hit before.”

She continued, “Once again, international terrorism is showing its cruel and inhuman face today.”

The attack at a center of tourism here underscored what security and political analysts say is an inevitable and grim byproduct of the fight against terrorism and the self-declared Islamic State: Attacks against so-called “soft targets,” while few in number, are likely to continue with chilling regularity.

Tuesday’s bombing came as the Islamic State faces increasing pressure from an international military coalition — of which Turkey and Germany are members — that has accelerated attacks on the group’s oil infrastructure and has recently driven it from one of its key cities in Iraq, the provincial capital Ramadi.

“It’s clear that they’ve diversified their strategy and are determined to target more soft targets outside their areas, that is, in Syria and Iraq,” said Daniel Benjamin, a scholar at Dartmouth and a former coordinator for counterterrorism at the State Department during President Obama’s first term.

He added, “There is a paradoxical situation where they seem to be inflicting more pain while at the same time they are suffering setbacks.”

As the bomber struck on Tuesday morning in Sultanahmet, the heart of Istanbul’s old city, workers in Baghdad were still clearing away the wreckage and blood from an Islamic State attack Monday night on a shopping mall that brought with it the return of old fears for the city’s residents. Almost daily for years, the city faced the type of attack that hit Istanbul.

Ahmed Saadawi, a prominent Iraqi writer, received a top Arabic literary prize in 2014 for his novel “Frankenstein in Baghdad,” which delved into the effects such random violence can have on a society, by breaking down social bonds as fear prevails. Iraq is an extreme case, and in previous years, the violence led to all-out sectarian conflict.

But in Turkey, Europe, the United States and elsewhere, the rising anxiety about terrorism is eroding empathy and compassion while stoking xenophobia and intolerance.

“When fear controls a society, it will distract and confuse people’s minds, and it will erase the lines between enemies and friends,” Mr. Saadawi said. His honored novel, he said, is largely about fear: “How it makes people scared to walk in the streets, thinking, who is the enemy? Who is the friend?”

The Islamic State, also known as ISIS or ISIL, did not immediately claim credit for the attack Tuesday, but Prime Minister Ahmet Davutoglu said it appeared that the attacker — whom President Recep Tayyip Erdogan identified as Syrian — had connections with the terrorist group.

For Mr. Erdogan, the participation of a Syrian is likely to complicate his government’s cooperation with the European Union in stemming the flow of migrants from Turkey’s shores to Europe, while also steeling his resolve to keep Syrians out of Turkey altogether.

The country has already effectively shut its southern border with Syria to new refugees. Last week, it instituted new visa regulations for Syrians arriving by air, a decision that stranded hundreds of Syrians at the airport in Beirut.

It is unclear if the bomber looked specifically for Germans to kill. “By targeting Germans, ISIS seems intent on creating an anti-refugee backlash in Europe, hoping to fuel already rising anti-Islam sentiments on the Continent,” said Soner Cagaptay, an expert on Turkey at the Washington Institute for Near East Policy.

For Turkey, the attack was the latest spillover from the Syrian civil war. In October, two suicide bombers who the authorities say were working for the Islamic State struck a rally in Ankara, the Turkish capital. Nearly 100 people were killed in a crowd of mostly Kurds gathering to demand an end to the conflict between Turkey and Kurdish militants in the southeast.

Tuesday’s attack, while less deadly, was by some accounts more resonant, as it seemed unconnected to Turkish domestic politics and designed to deal a blow to the country’s $30 billion tourism industry.

As the Syrian civil war metastasized over the last five years, Turkey, in its determination to see Syria’s president, Bashar al-Assad, ousted, supported rebel groups, offering its territory as a transit route for fighters and weapons. Turkey has faced heavy criticism from its Western allies, including the United States, for enabling the rise of the Islamic State.

Only recently, analysts say, has Turkey seemed determined to clamp down on the group, conducting raids against cells in Turkey and building a wall on a portion of its southern border with Syria, opposite territory controlled by the Islamic State.

Many critics say that those efforts came too late and that in recent years the group was able to build up networks in Turkey that are now targeting the country as retaliation for the recent clampdown.

“It’s very difficult to stop suicide bombers, especially if you have allowed an infrastructure to grow in your country,” said Mr. Benjamin, the scholar at Dartmouth and former American counterterrorism official.

The explosion in Sultanahmet occurred close to the German Fountain, a gazebo-style structure that commemorates a visit by Kaiser Wilhelm II in 1898. The blast left several bodies around the base of an Egyptian obelisk that was carved around 1490 B.C. and was brought to the city in A.D. 390 by the Roman emperor Theodosius.

The Germans reported that at least eight Germans died, while the Turkish government put the number at nine. The other tourist who died was Peruvian, according to news agencies. At least 15 other people were wounded, including nine Germans, along with citizens of Norway, Peru, South Korea and Turkey. The suicide bomber also died.

More than three hours after Tuesday’s explosion, a group of waiters stood in shock outside a nearby restaurant.

“I don’t know what to say — I guess we were expecting this, but not an explosion this big,” said one of the workers, who gave his name only as Ibrahim, his eyes fixed on the Blue Mosque, an early-17th-century landmark.

On a usual day, the restaurant would be busy with customers, with lines forming outside.

“Tourism had already dried up after last year’s explosion, but after this, it’s game over,” said Ayse Demir, 36, a shopkeeper at an arts and crafts shop, referring to an attack at a police station that killed an officer. “No one is going to risk their lives for shopping and history.”

IS恐攻伊斯坦堡 炸死10外國遊客

土耳其伊斯坦堡市的蘇丹艾哈邁德觀光區十二日上午發生自殺炸彈攻擊，爆炸地點距著名的藍色清真寺僅廿五公尺，至少造成十人喪生和十五人受傷，死者全是外國人，其中至少九人是德國觀光客。土國總理達夫托葛魯說，犯案的是來自敘利亞的「伊斯蘭國」（IS）外籍自殺炸彈客，他已致電德國總理梅克爾表示哀悼。

土耳其媒體報導，傷者中有九名德國人、兩名秘魯人、挪威人和南韓人，沒有台灣觀光客。

土國總統厄多岡發表談話表示：「我強烈譴責敘利亞自殺炸彈客發動的恐怖攻擊。很遺憾有人喪生，包括外國人和當地人。這次事件再次顯示，我們必須團結一致對抗恐怖主義。」

他說：「土耳其是在此地區活動的恐怖組織的頭號目標，因為土耳其決心對抗所有恐怖組織。」

土耳其副總理庫特莫斯說，自殺炸彈客是最近從敘利亞進入土耳其的好戰分子，不在土耳其的監控名單上。他稍早說，炸彈客的身分已從他的殘肢鑑識出來，是一九八八年出生的敘利亞人。

德國總理梅克爾稍早說：「我們很關切死傷者中可能有德國人，他們是德國旅遊團的團員。」

她說：「今天伊斯坦堡被攻擊；巴黎也曾被攻擊；之前突尼西亞和安卡拉都被攻擊。國際恐怖主義今天再度顯露它殘酷和沒有人性的面目。」

德國外交部官網呼籲在伊斯坦堡的德國遊客「避開群眾聚集的公共場所和觀光景點」，並警告「土耳其全國各地」都可能再遭到恐怖攻擊。

蘇丹艾哈邁德區是伊斯坦堡主要觀光區，區內有通稱藍色清真寺的蘇丹艾哈邁德清真寺和聖索菲亞大教堂。

爆炸發生在狄奧多西方尖碑附近，這座埃及方尖碑是伊斯坦堡最醒目的紀念碑之一。

德國觀光客卡洛琳說：「爆炸聲驚人，地都在動，並發出強烈的氣味，非常刺鼻。我和女兒拚命跑到附近的建築，待了半小時，真是嚇人。」警方封鎖現場，禁止民眾靠近，以免萬一發生第二次爆炸。

一如之前的恐攻案，當局立刻實施新聞管制，切斷電視的現場轉播，禁止媒體播出死傷者畫面和報導調查細節。

IS過去一年在土耳其發動三次恐攻，包括在安卡拉炸死一百多人。美國為首的聯軍持續對敘利亞和伊拉克境內的IS目標發動空襲，土耳其也扮演一角。

土耳其介入敘利亞內戰甚深，支持敘國反抗軍對抗阿塞德政權，並防止庫德族坐大。

厄多岡十二日表示，俄國準備在敘利亞北部的拉塔基亞省建立「敘利亞精品國」（boutique Syrian state），因此俄國一直攻擊該省的土耳其同胞土庫曼人。

原文參照：
http://www.nytimes.com/2016/01/13/world/europe/explosion-in-istanbul-tourist-district-kills-at-least-10.html

紐約時報中文版翻譯：
http://cn.nytimes.com/world/20160113/c13turkey/zh-hant/

Video：A man who saw the explosion in Istanbul’s central district of Sultanahmet on Tuesday recounts what he saw.
http://nyti.ms/1P82CSo

Video：President Recep Tayyip Erdogan of Turkey condemned the suicide bombing in Istanbul and said the attack was carried out by a person with Syrian origins.
http://nyti.ms/22XG5SV

Video：Chancellor Angela Merkel of Germany expressed sympathy for the victims of the suicide bombing in Istanbul and said the fight against terrorism would prevail.
http://nyti.ms/1mVnRkC

2016-01-13．聯合報．A13．國際．編譯田思怡