The terrorist attack in the town of Reyhanlı on May 11, which left over fifty dead, making it the deadliest terror attack ever in Turkey, has generally been interpreted as being a consequence of Turkey’s involvement in the Syrian civil war, and the Syrian regime is assumed to have been responsible for it. However, there is nonetheless a divergence of views among the columnists in the Turkish press as to what Turkey’s response to Syria should be. While a “hawk” like Cengiz Candar advocates retaliation against Syria in order to deter it from repeating the attack in Reyhanlı, a more “dovish”, reasoned, attitude in fact dominates, with the government invited to recognize that things in Syrian are neither black nor white. Many columnists express concern that sectarian tensions will be inflamed in Turkey, and it is also pointed out that the old habits of engaging in a designation of “internal enemies” has  returned, poisoning the societal atmosphere.

The violent dispersal by the police of workers and leftist groups that attempted to march to the Taksim square in Istanbul on 1 May has been severely criticized as a manifestation of state authoritarianism. Columnists who are critical of the AKP government wrote that the government wanted to set an example, demonstrating that the very act of defying the decisions of the state is intolerable and will be violently suppressed. Leading liberal commentator Hasan Cemal made the pessimistic observation that the Turkish state never changes, while pro-government commentator Mustafa Akyol wrote that the problem is the fanaticism of the left. Akyol held that it is unreasonable to blame the government, and argued that those responsible for the violence were the trade unions and the left who deliberately and fanatically picked a fight with the police.