“The allegation about the gun attack is true. We did our part regarding the issue,” a Kırıkkale businessman has said, proudly confessing that he carried out an attack on a store owned by an alleged follower of the Gulen movement, which the government accuses of masterminding a coup attempt in July.
With top government officials calling on people to lend a hand in its all-out war against sympathizers of the movement, their calls seem to have found support within some segments of society.
A furniture shop owned by Ekrem Gök, president of the Kırıkkale Chamber of Commerce and Industry, was attacked by a gunman on Friday. Gök had earlier been arrested over his alleged ties to the movement.
“It makes our blood boil. My fight against them will continue throughout my entire life. We always stand by our country and the state,” Denizhan Vural, also a prominent businessman in Kırıkkale, told reporters the same day.
In mid-August, Turkey’s consul general in Rotterdam called on people to “do their part” against the movement.
The Kırıkkale attack was the latest of such incidents as the Turkish government has gradually geared up its discriminatory discourse against the movement since July 15.
Several stores across Turkey that sell books of Fethullah Gülen, the US-based Muslim cleric by whom the movement is inspired, were earlier been reported to have been looted by angry mobs. (Turkey Purge)