Go figure.   Turkey claims they refuse to support U.S. attacks against ISIL because some of their people are “hostages” to ISIL.  

Couldn’t possibly have anything to do with the fact that Turkey coordinated the 2012 arms shipments for ISIL, and provided the training base for the Jihadist goals in Syria.  Nah, couldn’t be.  

TURKEY – Defense Minister İsmet Yılmaz has ruled out any support from Turkey for the US military airstrike that began on Friday targeting artillery belonging to the al-Qaeda splinter group, the terrorist “Islamic State” (IS), near Arbil, in Iraq.
Speaking to journalists on Saturday in the province of Sivas, Yılmaz said: “We are not providing any kind of support [to the US military strikes on the IS in Iraq]. The US, using its own means, with its military aircraft launched from warships [in the Gulf area], is bombing IS positions that the US sees as a threat.”
Turkey is sensitive about becoming involved in the US military hitting IS targets in Iraq due to a hostage crisis.
The IS kidnapped 49 people from the Turkish consulate general in Mosul on June 11, including Consul-General Öztürk Yılmaz, diplomatic staff, special forces members and children. There is still no word on the release of the hostages two months later. The government has imposed a gag order on reporting about the hostage issue, claiming that news stories may provoke the IS militants and put the hostages’ lives in danger.
“Our consulate general staff, 49 of them, is still in the hands of the IS. Therefore, what we can do is limited due to our obligations to the well-being of these people,” said Yılmaz. He added: “We are hopeful now. There are no problems. We hope they [Turkish hostages] will return to Turkey in good health.”
US military aircraft hit artillery belonging to the IS on Friday, one day after US President Barack Obama announced that he had authorized limited airstrikes against the IS to avert the seizure of Arbil, the capital of the Kurdish Regional Government (KRG).  (read more)