DUBAI: An elderly Syrian woman seen in a video being kicked in the face by a Turkish man in the southern Turkish city of Gaziantep has been visited by the city’s mayor following the assault.
Earlier, news reports said a Turkish man had been arrested after assaulting the 70-year-old Syrian woman after the viscous attack was captured on camera and the video footage went viral.
In the video the woman, identified as Leila Mohammed, 70, is seen sitting on a bench while a number of men speaking Turkish approach her. One of them brutally kicks her in the face, causing her to scream in pain and cover her eye with one hand. The man was arrested later and identified as Sakir Cakir, 39.
The incident triggered a wave of solidarity, with messages to the Syrian woman and ones calling on the Turkish authorities to take action against the aggressor.
Hashtags like #SakirCakirTutuklansin (Arrest Sakir Cakir) trended in Turkish to show solidarity with Leila, with many Syrians and Turkish social media users posting photos of themselves covering one eye, just like her.
The mayor of Gaziantep province, Davut Gul, on Tuesday shared photos of his visit to the elderly woman on Twitter, saying in Turkish: “We stand with the oppressed against the oppressor.”
Leyla teyzemizi darp eden ki?i tutukland?.
Hastaneye yat?r?larak kontrolleri ve tedavisi ba?lat?ld?.
E?im ve mesai arkada?lar?m?zla birlikte teyzemizi ziyaret ederek Aziz milletimizin ge?mi? olsun dileklerini ilettik.
Zalimin kar??s?nda mazlumun yan?nday?z pic.twitter.com/3NYMkkAZ2L
— Davut G?L (@gul_davut) May 31, 2022
The mayor confirmed that the aggressor was arrested.
Turkey hosts more than 3.6 million Syrians, the largest population of Syrians displaced by the conflict that started in 2011.