Istanbul: Trkiye has arrested more than 350 ISIS members across the country. Turkish police arrested as many as 357 suspected members of the Islamic State (IS) group in raids across the country today, one day after a bloody clash between police and IS members in the northeast of the country.
According to Thai News Agency, Turkish Interior Minister Ali Yerligaya announced via X that authorities had conducted operations in 21 out of 81 provinces nationwide and would never give any opportunity to ISIS, which is trying to force Turkey to surrender to terrorism. Earlier, the Istanbul prosecutor's office, in the country's largest city, announced that police had raided a total of 114 locations in Istanbul and two other provinces, seizing various documents and digital materials.
This major operation follows yesterday's eight-hour siege of a house in Yalova, a town on the Marmara Sea coast south of Istanbul, where police clashed with ISIS members. The resulting firefight left three police officers killed and eight wounded, while six ISIS members were killed. A week prior, authorities had detained more than 100 suspected ISIS members in connection with plots to carry out attacks during the Christmas and New Year periods.
The US previously announced it had conducted an offensive against ISIS in northwestern Nigeria last week and targeted ISIS groups in Syria on December 19th in retaliation for ISIS killing an American soldier. Meanwhile, Australian police stated that the father and son who carried out the Bondi Beach shooting in Sydney on December 14th appeared to have been influenced by ISIS ideology.
Over the past decade, Turkish authorities have frequently blamed ISIS for attacks on civilians in various locations. Police have conducted regular crackdowns on the group over the years, leading to a decrease in attacks. Turkey was a key transit point for foreign fighters and ISIS members seeking to enter and leave Syria during the civil war that lasted from 2011 to December of last year.