The Jan. 12 suicide attack on Istanbul’s tourism center of Sultanahmet Square starkly illustrates how Turkey's preoccupation with other battles has dangerously shifted its radar away from the Islamic State (IS). The attack, which targeted a foreign tourist group, killed 10 people and wounded 15 others. Most of the victims were German.

Speaking that day, Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan said, "I strongly condemn the suicide bombing originating from Syria." The Justice and Development Party (AKP) government’s deputy Prime Minister Numan Kurtulmus first said the suicide bomber was a Syrian born in 1988. One hour later, the identity of the suicide bomber was revealed as Syrian Nabil Fadli and reports said he was born in Saudi Arabia.

There were three IS-related suicide bombing attacks in Turkey during 2015: in Sultanahmet last January, in Suruc in July and in Ankara in October. But there are major differences between those attacks and the recent Sultanahmet bombing.

First, one striking difference is that the bomber and all of the victims of the Jan. 12 attack were not Turks. This raises the question of whether IS — which is now on the defensive in Iraq and Syria — wants to shift its battlefield in part to Turkey. If IS is trying to ease the pressure it is under in Syria and Iraq by spreading its activity to Turkey, then similar operations are to be expected.