Terrorist attack had Church as Primary Target

Case information
Incident date
Country
Türkiye
Place
Eskisehir
Categories
  • Social Hostility / Intolerance
Attack Against
  • Faith
Perpetrator / Motive Indicators
  • Private
Societal Sphere
  • Media
Hate Crime & Violent Incidents
  • Physical Violence
Place of Incident
  • Church
Bias Indicators
  • Comments/Written Statements/Gestures/Graffiti
  • Organized Hate Groups
  • Significance of Property/Structure/Location to religious community
Reported to Police
  • Yes
Response of Local Authorities
  • Investigated

In early 2025, an 18-year-old man was arrested in Eskişehir, Turkey, after carrying out a stabbing attack that injured five people in a local café. According to Turkish media outlet T24, the suspect had initially planned a terrorist attack on a nearby church but changed his target at the last minute, opting instead to attack civilians in a coffeehouse.

While T24 clearly reported that the local church was the original intended target, this information was notably absent in several Western media reports. For example, the BBC, which covered the incident based on T24’s reporting, omitted the detail that the church had been the primary target of the planned attack.

Instead, some media outlets framed the stabbing as having occurred near a mosque, which could suggest an anti-Muslim motive.

Sources