Turkish police carried out simultaneous raids on 35 locations in the western Turkish town of Manisa on Nov. 10 to detain suspects of the “parallel state.” The 26 detainees included lawyers and educators, but what really caught the attention of the media were the photos of two young handcuffed women wearing headscarves.

The operation was authorized by the Manisa public prosecutor, which targeted the movement of cleric Fethullah Gulen on “reasonable suspicion.” (Since the legal amendments of December 2014, it is possible for the authorities to detain anyone on “reasonable suspicion” without the need for firm evidence.) Such procedures in Turkey are controversial as they are measures that greatly facilitate the much-discussed war on the Gulen movement, which is accused of forming a so-called parallel state. But last week’s images of handcuffed headscarf-wearing women rekindled other ghosts from the past. For decades, the headscarf has been a highly controversial political symbol in Turkey. Veiled women were demonized and marginalized by the secularist authoritarian regime under the tutelage of the military. Meanwhile, the conservative and Islamist camp, politically represented by the Justice and Development Party (AKP), idealized the headscarf as the symbol of moral, virtuous — and of course law-abiding — women. So, the handcuffing of women wearing headscarves under the rule of the AKP government, and in an AKP-led “witch hunt,” raised many questions.

The images of headscarved women in handcuffs were quickly circulated in the traditional media and on social networking sites, sparking a public outcry from various sides. Police officers who participated in the operation were blamed for acting against the legal procedures for the detention of suspects, as handcuffs generally are to be placed on suspects only when they try to escape, harm themselves or others. Prime Minister Ahmet Davutoglu ordered an investigation and said, “Regardless of the content of the probe, required sensitivity should be displayed on the issue of safeguarding everybody’s rights within the framework of the procedures in the law.” On Nov. 11, the Interior Ministry announced that Manisa Police Chief Tayfur Erdal Ceren had been suspended.

Sympathizers of and media outlets close to the Gulen movement were generally outraged at the latest manifestations of the “hate campaign” against them. For example, Ekrem Dumanli, the former editor of daily Zaman, called handcuffs “a symbol of oppression, tyranny and cruelty.” He drew importance to the headscarf — an otherwise irrelevant factor in detention — in this situation by stating, “It is significant in that this is an administration that grabs every chance it can to talk about the treatment that our ‘headscarved sisters’ deserve.” Some critics on social media also contrasted the images in Manisa to one where a leading Islamic State suspect and his wife were taken into police custody Aug. 7 in Turkey's western Anatolian province of Manisa — without any handcuffs.