Among thousands of people gathered at Taksim Square to celebrate the New Year, a group of Syrian migrants gathered opened a flag of the Free Syrian Army (FSA).
The video showing the flag and the people chanting in the Taksim Square shared by thousands of people on the social media.
A social media campaign with the hashtag hit the Twitter with a hashtag #suriyelileriistemiyoruz (we don't want Syrians) used by the anti-immigrant people in Turkey.
After the incident, the main opposition party CHP's Deputy Chairman Ünal Çeviköz stated that activities against the Syrian regime were allowed in Turkey and requested establishing a commission in Parliament to investigate those responsible for the incident.
In January 2018, Turkey and the Free Syrian Army launched Operation Olive Branch in Afrin. The goal of the operation was to "clear" Turkey's Syrian border of the Kurdish People's Protection Units (YPG) and the Democratic Union Party (PYD).
The cooperation continues, as the Turkish and FSA troops were located to the border of Manbij, getting ready for a possible military operation in northern Syria announced to be delayed after Trump's decision to withdraw US forces from Syria, targeting the US-backed Kurdish YPG militant group.
"The FSA is not a terrorist group, but a national organization that has people from different ethnicities who have the spirit to defend their homeland," Erdoğan said during the government's cooperation with the FSA in military operations against Syria.
It is widely known that the West and Ankara-backed FSA, as well as the IS, fought against the Syrian government and the Kurds in 2012 and 2013.
Several FSA groups were together with the Al-Qaeda linked-al-Nusra Front and Ahrar al-Sham groups in the attacks targeting Idlib near the Turkish border in March 2015.
