It has fallen to Mayor Leyla İmret to explain the aims and objectives of the armed militants that established themselves in Cizre: “We are waging a civil war in Cizre against Turkey.” In her statement to the British media, she defines Cizre as “the focal point of the civil war [they] have launched against Turkey.”
The hurt of losing these martyrs and the identity of the killers were suddenly relegated to the background. Even opposition leader Kılıçdaroğlu cited not the PKK but Erdoğan by name while condemning the attack.
While the AKP is still largely under Erdoğan’s influence, it also has a complex, differentiated, multi-layered, multi-variable social and economic background.
At the end of the day, if today we are heading for new elections, it is the MHP that bears the strategic and the CHP that bears the tactical blame for this outcome.