SRINAGAR, India — Gunmen shot and killed at least 26 tourists on Tuesday at a resort in Indian-controlled Kashmir, police said in what appeared to be a major shift in a regional conflict in which tourists have largely been spared.

Police said it was a “terror attack” and blamed militants fighting against Indian rule.

“This attack is much larger than anything we’ve seen directed at civilians in recent years,” Omar Abdullah, the region’s top elected official, wrote on social media.

Two senior police officers said at least four gunmen, whom they described as militants, fired at dozens of tourists from close range. The officers said at least three dozen people were wounded, many of them reported to be in serious condition.

Most of the killed tourists were Indian, the officers said, speaking on condition of anonymity in keeping with departmental policy. Officials collected at least 24 bodies in Baisaran meadow, some 3 miles from the disputed region’s resort town of Pahalgam. Two others died while being taken for medical treatment.

There was no immediate claim of responsibility. Police and soldiers were searching for the attackers.

“We will come down heavily on the perpetrators with the harshest consequences,” India’s home minister, Amit Shah, wrote on social media. He arrived in Srinagar, the main city in Indian-controlled Kashmir, and convened a meeting with top security officials.

Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi was cutting short his two-day visit to Saudi Arabia and returning to New Delhi early Wednesday, the Press Trust of India news agency reported.

Mirwaiz Umar Farooq, a key resistance politician and Kashmir’s top religious cleric, condemned what he described as a “cowardly attack on tourists,” writing on social media that “such violence is unacceptable and against the ethos of Kashmir which welcomes visitors with love and warmth.”

The gunfire coincided with the visit to India of U.S. Vice President JD Vance, who called it a “devastating terrorist attack,” he said on social media. “Over the past few days, we have been overcome with the beauty of this country and its people. Our thoughts and prayers are with them as they mourn this horrific attack.”

U.S. President Donald Trump on social media noted “deeply disturbing news out of Kashmir. The United States stands strong with India against terrorism.” Other global leaders, including Russian President Vladimir Putin and Italian Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni, condemned the attack.

“The United States stands with India,” U.S. Secretary of State Marco Rubio said on X.

Nuclear-armed rivals India and Pakistan each administer a part of Kashmir but both claim the territory in its entirety.

Kashmir has seen a spate of targeted killings of Hindus, including immigrant workers from Indian states, after New Delhi ended the region’s semi-autonomy in 2019 and drastically curbed dissent, civil liberties and media freedoms. Tensions have been simmering as India has intensified its counterinsurgency operations.

But despite tourists flocking to Kashmir in huge numbers for its Himalayan foothills and exquisitely decorated houseboats, they have not been targeted.

The region has drawn millions of visitors who enjoy a strange peace kept by ubiquitous security checkpoints, armored vehicles and patrolling soldiers.