Most commentators in the Middle East linked the Istanbul bombings to instability in Iraq and the Palestinian territories, and the visit to Britain by President Bush. Michael Jansen reports from Dubai.
But the liberal Arab nationalist newspaper The Gulf Today, published in the United Arab Emirates, pointed out that the attacks coincided with the initial manoeuvres in Turkey of Nato's rapid response force and urged contributors to prepare quickly for waging a concerted campaign against terrorism.
Qatar's Al-Watan agreed, saying: "With every terrorist attack, the world becomes more dangerous and insecure." Then the paper asked: "Will the international community remain a helpless onlooker?"
Another Emirates newspaper, Akhbar al-Arab, predicted, glumly: "Terrorism will remain a sword placed on everyone's necks. Terrorism begets terrorism and most of the time its victims are the innocent."
The Jordan Times, which like most other Arab papers reflects the views of the country's government, said the "twin blasts in Istanbul and the attack against the Jordanian embassy in Baghdad (last August) . . . carry the hallmarks of groups that make no distinction" between targets, whether "children or adults, Muslims, Christians or Jews, Arabs in Riyadh or Britons in Istanbul, Iraqi guards in Baghdad or Italian peacekeepers in Nassiriya, Red Cross volunteers or UN employees - everything and everyone is game for the terrorists."
The paper made the point that terrorist organisations choose "softer" targets like synagogues and British sites in Istanbul because tight security made it "impossible . . . to hit US military installations or other (hardened) targets."
The writer expounded on a theme common in the regional media, blaming President Bush for exacerbating "extremism" by engaging in what they describe as an illegal pre-emptive war and indulging in "cowboy" diplomacy". Mr Bush and the British Prime Minister, Mr Tony Blair, were castigated for failing to provide solutions to both the Palestinian-Israeli and the Iraqi crises. The editorial writer remarked that during their joint press conference in London on Thursday the two leaders made "no mention of how they intended to secure Iraq's self-determination and self-government, or protect its independence and guarantee that its natural resources are enjoyed by its own people. All they were capable of talking about . . . was continuing the military occupation of that country."
Lebanon's mainstream newspaper Al-Nahar called the bombings in Turkey "a declaration of war against Bush" while the Palestinian Al-Quds warned it is "only a matter of time before such atrocities arrive in Britain".
Qatar's Al-Rayah adopted a defensive line, voicing concern that the "bombings in Istanbul, Riyadh, Casablanca, Bali and elsewhere have been linked to Islam in spite of the fact that (the religion) is innocent of such criminal acts."