Turkey Comes Apart

Erdogan's Legacy of Fear

 In the early hours of January 1, a lone gunman stormed Istanbul’s Reina nightclub, shooting 39 people dead and wounding 71 others before making his escape. The next day, the Islamic State (ISIS) claimed responsibility for the attack, describing Turkey as a “protector of the cross” and claiming to have “struck one of the most famous nightclubs where Christians celebrate their apostate holiday.” The intimation of apostasy refers to the fact that since the 1930s, many Turks have celebrated the New Year with trappings more frequently associated with Christmas, such as Santa Claus bringing gifts to children. Yet virtually all of the revelers and staff in Reina at the time of the attack were Muslim. In recent months, many Turks had started to avoid Istanbul’s best-known nightspots—particularly Reina—precisely because they feared an attack by ISIS. But the club had remained popular with Arab tourists. Only 11 of those killed in the nightclub were Turks; the other 28 were foreigners, mostly Arabs from other countries in the Middle East.

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