When No One Is Truly Safe

As the attacks on innocents in Muslim countries show, the terrorists inspired by al-Qaeda are upping the stakes of their jihad

Cafer Yilmaz was at work in his bakery on a broad boulevard in Istanbul's modern new financial district at about 11 a.m. last Thursday when a tremendous bang shook down the building's windows and walls. Across the street, yellow smoke poured from the 18-story headquarters of the British-owned HSBC bank, where a pickup truck packed with homemade bombs had just set off a mighty explosion. "That first moment was not at all like you would imagine from the movies," Yilmaz says. "No one was screaming or running. If you had slapped me, I would probably have just stared blankly at you."

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