On Nov. 6, the head of Turkey’s Alevi-Bektashi Federation, Baki Duzgun, received a call from the police anti-terror department, inviting him to their headquarters in Ankara. Duzgun was in Istanbul that day, so a delegation representing the federation went to the meeting. It turned out the police had an alarming message to convey. “We got intelligence that the Islamic State [IS] is planning attacks on Alevi institutions. You have to take precautions,” they said.
That’s how Duzgun recounted the meeting to Al-Monitor. And was he surprised with the police’s message? “No,” he said, “not at all.”
