Tanker Petty Officer Senior Sergeant Okkes Karaca, who served in the Special Forces, was martyred on December 23, 2016, as a result of the ISIS attack during Operation Euphrates Shield. If 25-year-old Karaca had returned from the operation alive, he would have been tried for being a member of a terrorist organization.
The indictment numbered 2017/2619, prepared by the Istanbul Chief Public Prosecutor’s Office, also included the name of the martyred petty officer Okkes Karaca. The indictment, prepared within the scope of July 15, contained statements from many soldiers and civilians. In the indictment, where there was no evidence other than the statements, Okkes Karaca was described as a member of the Hizmet Movement and accused of being a terrorist in the statement of Petty Officer Mustafa Y. However, there was no evidence of this in the indictment. Petty Officer Okkes Karaca was recruited to the Euphrates Shield Operation staff and sent to Al Bab while the investigation was continuing and these statements were being given. And then he was killed in an ISIS attack.
Following the martyrdom of Petty Officer Karaca, the investigation against him was not advanced and Karaca’s file was closed. Okkes Karaca, who fought against ISIS in Al Bab, was buried in his hometown Kahramanmaras after he was martyred. Deputy Prime Minister Veysi Kaynak also attended the funeral.

If he had not been a martyr, they would have called him a “Traitor”
Martyr Petty Officer Okkes Karaca was buried on 23 December 2016. The funeral of the martyr was first brought to his father’s house in Kale Mahallesi of the central Onikisubat District. When the funeral came home, the mother of the martyr, Şerife Karaca and his siblings burst into tears. After the prayer, the funeral was taken to Mimar Sinan Mosque. Deputy Prime Minister Veysi Kaynak, Governor of Kahramanmaras Vahdettin Ozkan, deputies, Metropolitan Mayor Fatih Mehmet Erkoc, Brigadier General İbrahim Ozbudun from Malatya 2nd Army Command, military and civilian officials, the family and relatives of the martyr and thousands of people attended the ceremony held here.
At the ceremony, Okkes Karaca’s brother Ramazan and his relatives, who were in the uniform of Okkes Karaca, who joined the Turkish Armed Forces in 2012 and participated in the Euphrates Shield operation while serving in the Special Forces Command, fell into a coffin wrapped in the Turkish flag and lamented. Martyr Petty Officer Okkes Karaca, whose father passed away a while ago and was single, was buried in the neighborhood cemetery, amid tears, after the funeral prayer.
After the ceremony, Grand Union Party (BBP) Chairman Mustafa Destici also visited Karaca’s father’s house in Kale Mahallesi. Destici was accompanied by Erol Yazıcıoglu, President of the European Turkish Union, Murat Aslan, President of the Alperen Ocakları, and Hasan Kızıldag, the Provincial President of the BBP, and party members. Mustafa Destici expressed his condolences to the family, and then read the Holy Qur’an and prayed.

Did someone want them to be martyrs?
On the other hand, according to the news of Cevheri Guven from Bold Media, Infantry Specialist Corporal Fatih Saylak was also martyred as a result of the fire opened by the Syrian Army in Idlib on February 10. The martyr Saylak was from the village of Kale of Kahramanmaras. Just like petty officer Okkes Karaca, who was killed in Operation Euphrates Shield. The names of both martyrs from the same village were also included in the indictment No. 2017/2619 of the Istanbul Public Prosecutor’s Office.
In the statements of those who were given the title of “confessors”, it was claimed that the martyrs Saylak and Karaca were members of the Gulen Community, and they were charged with terrorism.
However, both names were sent to the regions where the conflict was the most dangerous after the statements about them, and then they became martyrs.
Ex-officers who were expelled from the TAF during the State of Emergency declared after July 15, drew attention to this situation and stated that the soldiers on the profiling lists were sent to the front lines in Syria.

The claim of former soldiers
Lieutenant Colonel Mehmet Alkan is one of them. According to Alkan, there is a list of 9 thousand people in the TAF. The names on this list are gradually expelled or sent to the front lines in Syria:
“According to the information I received in the famous public phone investigations in the recent period, they make decisions about 9 thousand people. The number is much higher, but they say, ‘Let’s do an operation on 9 thousand people,’ they say, ‘but we can’t do all of them, let’s do it 100 by 100 slowly’. Maybe a third of this number has been operated, the others are waiting their turn. The Armed Forces, in a sense, currently employs terrorists, according to its own determination. But waiting. Some of them are in Al-Bab in Syria or somewhere else. Especially they do not bring them back, because they are needed there. In other words, there is such a strange situation that if someone dies tomorrow, he will come back on his shoulders and be declared a martyr and cherished. But if it stays the next day, he will be operated on as a terrorist.” (from Lieutenant Colonel Alkan’s interview with Journalist Caglar Cilara)

Colonel Halis Tunc, who was expelled from the Turkish Armed Forces while he was a Military Attaché in Greece , takes this claim to the next level:
Many officers/petty officers were released pending trial by the state at different times. Although they continue to be prosecuted as terrorists, they were sent to Syria for an operation after the foreign travel ban was lifted.” (From his article on 15 July.info)
Chief Lieutenant Celebi Bozbıyık, who was martyred on October 15, 2019 in Manbij during the Peace Spring Operation, is one of them. First Lieutenant Bozbıyık, who was detained for 15 days during the state of emergency, was released while the investigation for “membership in a terrorist organization” continued and was sent to the front in Syria. He was martyred in the conflict in Manbij.

Those who survived the conflict are detained
Journalist Muyesser Yıldız, who closely follows the Turkish Armed Forces, gives similar information:
“Do you know that many soldiers who went to the operation in Iraq and Syria were detained on the day they returned because of public phone investigations? Especially there is one; He rendered very important services after July 15, fought in Al Bab and Afrin, and was detained on his return. He is someone who has been sent abroad many times to fulfill very special duties given by the Turkish Armed Forces and prosecutors’ offices after he was released after judicial control, that is, with a ban on leaving the country. After all, he was recently suspended!..” (From Muyesser YILDIZ’s article on ODATV)
SOURCES:

Ökkeş Karaca

https://www.hurriyet.com.tr/yerel-haberler/kahramanmaras/suriyede-sehit-olan-astsubay-okkes-karaca-kah-40315430
https://boldmedya.com/2020/02/11/sehit-olunca-teror-yargilamasi-durduruldu/
https://www.haberler.com/suriye-de-sehit-olan-astsubay-okkes-karaca-9094595-haberi/
https://aktifhaber.com/gundem/suriyede-on-saflara-fislenen-askerler-gonderiliyor-h142537.html