The operations began at around 3 am local time, after Turkish soldiers and Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant (ISIL) militants engaged in a conflict in the town of Kilis near the Syria–Turkey border.

[1] Turkey had maintained a policy of inaction against the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant (ISIL) despite international calls to do more to combat the terrorist group.

On 20 July 2015, 32 socialist activists planning to cross the border to help with relief efforts in the Syrian town of Kobanî were killed in a suicide bombing in Suruç, Şanlıurfa Province.

Since 2013, a largely successful solution process between the Turkish government and the Kurdistan Workers' Party (PKK) had been in place, resulting in a ceasefire between the two sides after 40 years of Kurdish separatist conflict.

The meeting was attended by Deputy Prime Ministers Bülent Arınç and Yalçın Akdoğan, Interior Minister Sebahattin Öztürk, National Defence Minister Vecdi Gönül, the military Chief of Staff Necdet Özel, the Deputy Chief of Staff Yaşar Güler, Army chief Hulusi Akar, the Gendarmerie General Commander Abdullah Atay, the General Director of Security Celalettin Lekesiz, the Undersecretary of the National Intelligence Organisation Hakan Fidan and numerous other high-ranking civil servants from various government departments.

The decision taken after the meeting was to conduct police operations on suspected terrorists and to pursue airstrikes against ISIL on the Turkish-Syrian border.

[8] The operations began in the early hours of 24 July 2015, with Davutoğlu claiming that they were directed at ISIL, PKK, DKHP/C and other militant left-wing organisations that threatened public order in Turkey.

One terrorist was killed in the exchange and was identified to be Günay Özarslan, a female DHKP/C militant who had been wanted on charges of preparing for a suicide bombing.

In another operation in central İzmir, four suspects were taken into custody for participating in illegal demonstrations on behalf of a terrorist organisation.

In Şanlıurfa Province, where the bombings in the district of Suruç by ISIL resulted in the death of 32 youth activists, 49 different addresses linked to the PKK were raided, with a total of 35 arrests being made.

It was later claimed separately by Davutoğlu that 39 PKK suspects had been arrested in Ceylanpınar alone for alleged links to the killing of two police officers in the district on 22 July.

[19] On 25 July, police officers in Ceylanpınar, Suruç and Birecik arrested 20 suspects who were allegedly members of the PKK.

The Iğdır Provincial Directorate of Security began operations in the early hours of 24 July at different addresses, with 9 suspects being arrested on charges of spreading propaganda for the PKK.

The police officers taking party in the operations also confiscated two unlicensed firearms and numerous organisation-related documents.

[24] The Adana Directorate of Security designed an operation in the neighbourhood of Gülbahçesi in the district of Seyhan, in which 22 suspects thought to be members of the Patriotic Revolutionary Youth Movement (YDG/H) were arrested.