ISIL suspected in shooting of Syrian journalist in Turkey's southeast

GAZİANTEP – Doğan News Agency

DHA photo

The Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant (ISIL) is the main suspect in the shooting of Syrian journalist Mohammad Zahar al-Shurgat, 36, who was shot and severely injured in Turkey’s southeastern province of Gaziantep on April 10. 

Al-Shurgat, a journalist from pro-Free Syrian Army (FSA) Aleppo Today TV, was hospitalized and remains in critical condition.

Al-Shurgat, who was reportedly carrying several maps of certain regions in Syria, joined the FSA after the war in Syria started and was the commander of the Abu Bakr Brigade before he moved to Gaziantep 10 months ago. 

The journalist was receiving death threats from ISIL militants for the broadcasts he made against the jihadists, according to reports. 

Police are investigating footage of the incident, which was recorded by the security camera of a nearby business. The video footage showed the masked suspect approaching al-Shurgat from behind and running away in the same direction he had come from after the attack.  

The police are searching for the suspected ISIL militant and an investigation into the case is ongoing. 

Similar incidents have occurred in Turkish cities close to the Syrian border. A Syrian documentarist and activitist who reported on atrocities committed by the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant (ISIL) was assassinated, according to the group with which he worked, “Raqqa is Being Slaughtered Silently,” in Gaziantep on Dec. 27, 2015. 

“Film maker Naji Jerf, father of two children, was assassinated... today in Gaziantep” with a silencer-equipped pistol, the group said in a statement on Twitter.

At the end of October 2015, ISIL claimed responsibility for killing journalists Ibrahim Abdelkader and Fares Hamadi. They were found decapitated in a house in Şanlıurfa in southern Turkey.