AGI – More than 15 police officers were killed in the simultaneous attacks that occurred in the Russian region of Dagestan, where gunmen torched two synagogues and two Orthodox churches in the republic’s capital, Makhachkala, and the coastal city of Derbent. Several civilians also lost their lives in the attack, including Father Nikolaj, who served for more than forty years in the Orthodox church of Derbent, and at least four militiamen. Numerous injuries. A police checkpoint was also targeted, where six officers were killed.
Dagestan is one Russian region with a Muslim majority bordering Chechnya, also close to Georgia and Azerbaijan, where Russian authorities frequently carry out anti-terrorism operations.
In another incident, armed men opened fire on a vehicle carrying police officers, wounding one, in Sergokala, a village located between Makhachkala and Derbent and which falls in the Sergokalinsky district whose leader, Magomed Omarov, was arrested for his children’s alleged involvement in the attacks.
The Russian Anti-Terrorism Committee announced late in the evening the end of the “active phase” of the anti-terrorism operation in Derbent, where two attackers were killed. According to Dagestan’s Interior Ministry, law enforcement agencies also “eliminated four attackers in Makhachkala.” The Chairman of the Public Council of Jewish Communities of the Russian Federation, Boruch Gorinconfirmed that synagogues in Derbent and Makhachkala were set on fire.
Dagestan’s leader, Sergei Melikov, called the attacks “an attempt to destabilize society.” Patriarch Kirill, head of the Russian Orthodox Church and staunch supporter of the Kremlin, assured that the “enemy” seeks to destroy “interreligious peace” in Russia by planting “the seeds of hatred”.
Even the strongman of Chechnya, Ramzan Kadyrov, he called the attacks “a cowardly provocation and an attempt to cause conflict between religions”. Those responsible for the massacres, he told Ria Novosti “have no faith or nation”, are non-people “who must be killed on the spot”.
Russia in the crosshairs of terrorism
Dagestan was the scene in October of violent anti-Semitic riots at Makhachkala airport: a crowd of men invaded its runway as a plane from Israel landed.
Russia has been targeted on several occasions by ISIS and in March an attack on the Crocus events center on the outskirts of Moscow cost the lives of more than 140 people. Last weekend, several ISIS members were killed after taking two prison officers hostage in a prison in southern Russia.
Deputy Chairman of the Russian Security Council Dmitry Medvedev called the “massacre in Dagestan” a “cowardly terrorist attack, like the attack on Sevastopol”.
“Everything that happened in Crimea was not a military action, but a vile and atrocious terrorist attack against our people, committed on an Orthodox holiday, like the massacre in Dagestan, carried out by extremists. For us there is no difference between the Bandera regime (Ukrainian ultranationalist leader during the Second World War, ed.) and the crazy fanatics”, he wrote on Telegram.
