On 16 July 2016, The Conflict News claimed that "Alevi civilians [in Turkey are] protecting their neighborhoods as Islamists try to enter” after rogue soldier in the Turkish army launched a coup attempt to take control of the country. The Conflict News also published pictures of young people holding guns and covering their faces.

However, the people seen in the pictures were members of the far-left organization the Revolutionary People's Liberation Party–Front (DHKP-C), a group listed as a terrorist group by the Turkish state. Nowhere in Turkey was any Alevi citizen attacked or harmed.

It was later discovered that the masked DHKP-C militants holding guns were provoking a struggle against the failed coup.