Turkey: 9 Killed, 13 Wounded In School Shooting; Second Attack In 24 Hours

By Mansour Al-Maswari

(Albawaba) — Nine people were killed and 13 others injured, six critically, in a school shooting at Ayser Çalık Secondary School in the Onikişubat district of Kahramanmaraş province, southeastern Turkey, officials said Wednesday.

Interior Minister Mustafa Ciftci confirmed the toll, stating that emergency teams rushed the wounded to nearby hospitals, where several remain in intensive care. The attacker, a 14-year-old eighth-grade student, also died at the scene.

Authorities said the student entered the school armed with five firearms and multiple magazines believed to belong to his father, a retired police officer. He opened fire indiscriminately inside two fifth-grade classrooms before turning the weapon on himself in what officials described as a murder-suicide.

“This was solely a personal attack carried out by one of our students and not a terror incident,” Ciftci said, adding that the motive remains under investigation. The Justice Ministry has imposed a temporary broadcast ban on coverage to safeguard the inquiry.

Kahramanmaraş Governor Mukerrem Unluer said the attacker targeted classrooms at random, intensifying the shock in a country where such incidents are rare.

The tragedy comes less than 24 hours after a separate school shooting in Siverek, in Şanlıurfa province, where an 18-year-old former student wounded 16 people at Ahmet Koyuncu Vocational High School before taking his own life. That incident also remains under investigation.

The back-to-back attacks have raised alarm over school safety and access to firearms in Turkey. Officials have pledged a nationwide review of security measures, with Ciftci saying authorities “will take necessary precautions” to prevent similar incidents.