Breakdown of Müttefiklerin saldırıyı kınadığı hakkında bir rapor okudum.
bir
a / an
okumak
to read
rapor
report
hakkında
about, concerning
Questions & Answers about Müttefiklerin saldırıyı kınadığı hakkında bir rapor okudum.
How does the grammar of müttefiklerin saldırıyı kınadığı hakkında work to mean "about the allies condemning the attack"?
This is a factive complement clause. The action being talked about (condemning) is turned into a noun phrase using the -dIk suffix. The subject of the action gets the genitive case (müttefiklerin), and the verb gets a possessive suffix (kınadığı). The postposition hakkında simply follows this noun phrase to mean "about [that fact]".
Since müttefiklerin is plural, shouldn't the verb be kınadıkları instead of kınadığı?
Both are correct! In Turkish, when a plural subject has the genitive case, the possessive suffix on the participle can often just be the singular -ı / -i instead of the plural -ları / -leri. Using kınadıkları hakkında would also be perfectly natural here.
Why does saldırı take the accusative -yı inside this structure?
Because it is the specific direct object of the verb kınamak (to condemn) within the sub-clause. Even though the verb has been turned into a noun-like -dIk word, it still acts like a verb toward its own objects. Since it's a specific attack, we use the accusative saldırıyı.
Could I use dair instead of hakkında in this sentence?