Seven ISIS jihadis, 2 Turkish police killed in firefight in Diyabakir

Numan Kurtulmus, Turkey’s deputy Prime Minister, said two police officers were killed when they broke down a door rigged with explosives and five of their colleagues were injured.

In Tuesday’s operation, 21 people, including seven children, were detained in simultaneous raids on houses in Istanbul, Dogan news agency reported.

Turkey has ramped up operations against IS extremists ahead of elections this Sunday, in the face of opposition criticism that the government has been too soft on the self-proclaimed “caliphate” in neighbouring Syria.

Despite the fact that Turkey joined in summer the anti-IS coalition led by the USA, and even though IS members have killed Turkish citizens and police forces, Turkish President Tayyip Erdogan insists that PYD is a terrorist organisation which needs to be hit, even though it fights against the IS.

No casualties are reported, but a clash between the IS Group and Turkish forces in the Kurdish-dominated Diyarbakir ended in nine reported deaths.

The two brothers, along with Orhan Gonder, the alleged bomber of a pro-Kurdish HDP party demonstration in Diyarbakir, were recruited by a radical Islamist group called Dokumacilar, with links to IS.

News reports said the quartet was made up of three Turkish men and a German woman of Kazakh origin, and might be planning suicide attacks or a plane hijack.

Authorities said the IS was the prime suspect in the country’s deadliest terror attack in history.

Multiple houses were raided on Monday in the predominantly Kurdish city of Diyarbakir.

Daesh is among terrorist organizations accused of killing 102 people in two back-to-back bombings at a peace rally in the Turkish capital of Ankara on October 10.

Anatolia said Saturday that security forces feared the four were preparing a major attack “such as hijacking a plane or a vessel or detonating suicide bombs in a crowded location”.