Six ISIL (ISIS) fighters have been killed in a shootout in northwest Turkiye that also left three police officers dead, the Turkish Interior Ministry has said.
In a speech on Monday, Minister of Interior Ali Yerlikaya said that security forces carried out 108 separate overnight raids on alleged ISIL hideouts across 13 provinces.
One of the raids took place at 2am on Monday (23:00 GMT on Sunday) at a home in Yalova province’s Elmalik village, located south of Istanbul in a residential neighbourhood.
Fire was exchanged when officers raided the home, Yerlikaya said, resulting in the deaths of the three officers and the six alleged ISIL fighters. Yerlikaya said that the fighters killed in the attack were all Turkish citizens. Eight policemen and one night watchman were also wounded.
Five women and six children were safely evacuated from the house during the raid, the minister said.
Special forces from nearby Bursa province joined the operation to provide support, including enacting ongoing security measures in the area.
Residents and vehicles were not allowed into the area surrounding the targeted home, broadcaster TRT Haber reported earlier, while the Yalova governorate also suspended classes at five nearby schools.
Increasing focus on alleged ISIL strongholds
Throughout the holiday period, Turkish security forces have “intensified their operations targeting the sleeping cells of ISIL across Turkiye,” Al Jazeera’s Sinem Koseoglu reported from Istanbul.
On Thursday, Turkish authorities said they had conducted raids on 124 locations and apprehended 115 ISIL suspects.
Police had received intelligence that operatives were “planning attacks in Turkiye against non-Muslims in particular” during the holiday period, the Istanbul chief prosecutor’s office said.
The United States military also carried out extensive strikes against ISIL in neighbouring central and northeastern Syria earlier this month, hitting more than 70 targets. The strikes came a week after two American soldiers and an interpreter were killed in an attack in the Syrian city of Palmyra.
Turkiye, which shares a border with Syria, has expanded its efforts against ISIL in recent years. Turkish authorities say some ISIL operatives relocated to the country in 2019 after the group was vanquished in the parts of Iraq and Syria it then controlled.
Previous raids in March had led to the capture of nearly 300 suspected ISIL members across 47 provinces over two weeks.
Between 2013 and 2023, authorities arrested more than 19,000 people for suspected affiliations with the group, according to the Turkish presidency.
