Recent investigations have found that Gülenists had planned to assassinate top government officials, including Prime Minister Binali Yıldırım and President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan during the 96th anniversary ceremony of the Presidential Guard Regiment, which was to be held on July 18, if they had not been able to initiate coup attempt on July 15.

Turkish media outlets reported on Monday that Erdoğan, Yıldırım, Parliament Speaker İsmail Kahraman, National Defense Minister Fikri Işık and presidential advisers were invited to the ceremony. Gülenists demanded a definite response from the secretaries of the officials while providing them a different phone number than the existing RSVP phone number on the invitations. It has been claimed that according to their responses, the seating plan would have been altered in order to make it more suitable for assassination. The alleged plans for assassination would have targeted these government figures. Supposedly, a Gülenist clad in a military uniform would have shot the officials, only to be killed by other accomplices, allowing Gülenists cover up the scheme by saying that the gunmen was a lone wolf.

The Presidential Guard Regiment was raided by security forces, which detained 300 suspects. Lieutenant Colonel Ümit Gencer, who was among the putschists who raided the state-run Turkish Radio and Television Corporation (TRT) studios and forced anchor Tijen Karakaş to recite the coup manifesto, was also arrested.