Turkish Terrorist Bomb Kills Untargeted Israelis

A suicide bomber detonated his explosives on an Istanbul street on Saturday morning killing four people and wounding 36. Two groups of Israeli tourists apparently came together at the popular tourist spot just before the blast resulting in the deaths of three and wounding of at least 11 Israelis. The fourth victim was identified by Turkish officials as being Iranian. As has been the case with recent terrorist attacks, Turkish officials were trying to determine whether the incident was the doing of the Islamic State or the PKK — the Kurdistan Workers Party. When it became known that three victims of Saturday’s suicide bombing in Istanbul were Israeli citizens, security officials in both countries began to search for some indication that the Israelis were the primary targets of the terrorist. But even after no connection was found, the incident served to underscore the unsettled and shaky state of relations between the Turks and Israelis when an official of President Recep Tayyip Erdogan’s ruling AK Party tweeted her hopes that the Israelis wounded in the attack would die. Nevertheless, AK leadership acted quickly in having the tweet taken down and not long after the party announced it was taking steps to remove the tweeter, Member of Parliament Irem Atkas, the party’s director of digital communications, from her position.  Turkish Prime Minister Ahmet Davutoğlu condemned the attack and offered condolences “to the people of Israel.”