 following a series of raids as part of a nationwide sweep launched after three police officers were killed in a shootout during a house raid earlier this week.){kind=link}
Turkey arrested 26 suspected members of the Islamic State in Iraq and the Levant (ISIL) following a series of coordinated raids in northwestern Yalova province as part of a nationwide sweep launched after three police officers were killed in a shootout during a house raid earlier this week.
Police came under fire during an early morning operation in Yalova province on December 29. Interior Minister Ali Yerlikaya said six suspected ISIL militants were killed in the clash, while police officers İlker Pehlivan, Turgut Külünk and Yasin Koçyiğit died at the scene. Eight other officers and a neighborhood night watchman were wounded.
Security forces safely evacuated five women and six children from the targeted house during the operation, which lasted nearly eight hours and required reinforcements from the nearby province of Bursa. Authorities temporarily closed schools, cut electricity and gas supplies and restricted access to the area while the raid was underway.
In the aftermath of the clash, police launched coordinated raids across Yalova, detaining 42 suspects, including the five women who had been evacuated from the raided house. A court later ordered the arrest of 26 suspects. The remaining 16 suspects were released under judicial supervision.
The clash on Monday came after the İstanbul Chief Public Prosecutor’s Office ordered the detention of 137 suspected ISIL members over intelligence pointing to possible attacks during Christmas and New Year’s celebrations, with police taking 115 people into custody.
The crackdown expanded further on December 31, when Yerlikaya announced the detention of an additional 125 suspected ISIL members in raids across 25 provinces, including İstanbul, Ankara and Yalova. He said the nationwide sweep was launched in response to the deadly Yalova clash and ongoing intelligence assessments.
Turkey shares a 900-kilometer (560-mile) border with Syria and has faced repeated ISIL attacks in the past decade, including a January 1, 2017, nightclub attack in İstanbul that killed 39 people.
Turkish state media have also reported recent arrests of senior ISIL suspects outside Turkey, including a capture at the Afghanistan-Pakistan border that Turkish officials said was linked to planned suicide attacks.