Renewed violence for Turkey, Kurds

LICE, Turkey – The military helicopters swooped in over the Kurdish heartland and dropped incendiary powder on a raging brush fire – igniting a massive conflagration that raced through the mountains, devouring orchards and livestock. For Kurds living in nearby Lice, the recent Turkish operation brought back memories of the 1990s when the army twice burned the town to the ground.

The military may have been trying to smoke out Kurdish militants, who had allegedly set off a car bomb near Lice killing a soldier and wounding four more. But locals in Lice, where the rebels have widespread support, see a more sinister motive: “Just like the old days,” said local journalist Metin Bekiroglu, “they want to spread fear.”

In an abrupt reversal, Turkey and the Kurdish rebels appear to be hurtling toward the return of an all-out conflict that plagued the nation for decades, before a fragile peace process was launched in 2012. A truce that has helped bring social and economic stability to Turkey evaporated only one week into the government’s new offensive against the militant Kurdistan Workers Party, or PKK, which stretches from southeastern Turkey to northern Iraq.

The conflict escalated after a suicide attack in a crowd in the town of Suruc along the Syrian border. Days later, two policemen were killed in an apparent PKK attack, prompting the government to retaliate against the Kurdish rebels with airstrikes.

Turkish authorities also began a nationwide terror sweep netting more than 1,300 Islamic State, Kurdish and leftist terrorist suspects. Yet the vast majority had affiliation with the PKK. That prompted the Kurds to claim that Turkey’s moves against IS were really a pretext to crack down on the Kurdish rebels.

Turkey’s attention has turned to the PKK. Kurdish politicians and analysts say the airstrikes against Kurdish positions in northern Iraq are more extensive than at the height of the conflict that left thousands dead from guerrilla warfare and terrorist attacks.

Turkey’s state-run Anadolu Agency recently claimed that some 260 rebels had been killed in the air raids against PKK targets in Iraq, while the PKK charges there have also been civilian casualties. Many Turks fear that the peace process, which seemed on the verge of being clinched, is now dead.