DIYARBAKIR, Turkey — In the wee hours of Oct. 26, gunfire and explosions rocked Diyarbakir, the largest city of Turkey’s mainly Kurdish southeast, as anti-terror police raided 17 locations across the city, which has been the theater of daily unrest since July. In a handsome detached house, the security forces encountered stiff resistance. Two policemen were killed and five others injured as two men charging the squad in the garden blew themselves up. The ensuing clashes at the house lasted seven hours.

Residents initially thought it was yet another operation against the Kurdistan Workers Party (PKK), but cries of “Allahu akbar” — usually used by Islamists — echoed from the house, and word was soon circulating that it was an Islamic State (IS) safe house. When the gunfire was finally over, the house lay devastated, with seven of its occupants dead and 15 in police custody.

The governor’s office confirmed that the simultaneous raids on homes and offices in the city had targeted IS. Local residents, especially neighbors, were dismayed that such a large group of IS militants was able to entrench itself in the city, the stronghold of the Kurdish political movement.

Sevdet Gerkez, a next door neighbor, told Al-Monitor the group had moved in two months ago. “I didn’t suspect anything. Sometimes I would see them in the garden. The other day, I greeted them in Kurdish and wished them well for the new home. They didn’t understand, and then one responded in Turkish that he spoke Zaza and did not understand Kurdish,” she said. “A few times I saw them digging in the garden at night. Between themselves they spoke in Zaza and, I guess, Arabic.”