Want to know why ? When ISIS showed up , the Kurds got up and went to fight them , because ISIS was lining EVERYONE up , removing the Sunni from the line , and then killing EVERYONE else . Instead of joining the fight against ISIS , Turkey dealt and traded with them in hopes that they ' d fight Assad , and that they ' d create problems for the Kurds who if you remember , had just won a historic victory of gaining enough members to have their party in parliament . From 2012 till 2014 , the PKK was pretty much inactive , as the leader had called for a ceasefire as negotiations progressed . Then Erdogan gave ISIS free reign to come and go from Turkey , not ever trying to protect or police the border for more than a year after the fighting broke out . This allowed MANY MANY additional fighters to join ISIS in Syria . Which DID make things harder for Assad and the Kurds both . Then , after a particularly nasty bomb was set off in a Kurdish area by ISIS members who were allowed through multiple checkpoints with a bomb , the PKK started attacking Turkish officials that were in charge of those checkpoints . From there what you call terrorism has just spread . I say what you call terrorism because you don ' t seem to realize that by working with ISIS , your own government has been waging a terror campaign against the Kurds , and tried to help terrorists to fight Assad . Erdogans very obvious and heavy handed handling of this has made anyone with half a brain condemn his actions . He ' s not even being smart about it .