America’s shadow war in Syria

Published

April 4, 2017

Written by

Samuel Oakford

It began as a unilateral US campaign against Al Qaeda elements plotting overseas attacks. But now this expanded shadow war risks embroiling the United States in Syria’s affairs long after the last ISIL stronghold has fallen. An Airwars special report, in conjunction with Foreign Policy

The unilateral American shadow war against al Qaeda-linked militants in Syria is now in its 30th month. Unlike the anti-Islamic State campaign, where the United States releases daily strike reports, the war against al Qaeda is less transparent, receives less media attention, and involves both the US military and intelligence apparatus. What began as a narrow mission in Syria — targeting al Qaeda terrorists allegedly focused on international attacks — has in the past six months expanded in both scope and intensity, according to local reports and interviews with US officials.

Outside the headlines, this war is also causing a steadily increasing death toll among Syrian civilians. One of the latest strikes in the long-running US campaign occurred on March 16th, when US drones struck a mosque complex in the town of al-Jinah, in northern Syria. The United States says it is investigating the attack but insists it didn’t hit a mosque. To the incredulity of locals, it claims to have instead struck a nearby building where “an al Qaeda in Syria meeting” was taking place. One witness told the local outlet Smart News: “[T]his is a praying center … peaceful civilians praying. I am one of them, there are no terrorists here.”

Rescuers work to free victims after a March 16th US drone strike in al-Jinah, Syria. Screenshot from video by Moaz Alshami Shada

President Barack Obama had laid the groundwork for increased strikes against al Qaeda last fall, as his administration broadened the definition of who was a legitimate target in northern Syria. These strikes have continued with a similar intensity since President Donald Trump took office. Because of this escalation, Washington now finds itself ramping up to fight an ambiguously defined opponent that is deeply enmeshed in the opposition to President Bashar al-Assad’s regime. The surge in civilian casualties, meanwhile, risks further antagonizing Syrians towards the United States, thus creating a vicious cycle that risks extending the 16-year US ‘War on Terror’ far into the future.

During the past 30 months, Airwars researchers have tracked more than 30 apparent unilateral American strikes, almost all in the rebel-held northwestern Idlib province. Using the lowest estimate for each incident, these strikes have likely killed at least 91 civilians. The real strike and overall casualty numbers are probably far higher. First, while the United States does publicize some unilateral strikes — as it did for six strikes in January — others have gone unreported, including drone attacks apparently carried out by the CIA. Secondly, it is difficult to properly attribute some strikes, such as a February 7th strike in Idlib city that reportedly left two dozen civilians dead but has also variously been blamed on Russia and the Syrian regime. The Airwars data set includes all strikes publicly acknowledged by US officials, as well as other strikes that we believe are likely to have been carried out by the United States.

Nevertheless, the trend is clear: The United States is escalating its unilateral air war in Syria. More than half of the 35 likely US strikes that we have been able to clearly source have occurred in the past six months. Though these operations have been largely obscured by the ongoing and massive military campaigns in Mosul and Raqqa, they also seem poised to increase in the weeks and months ahead.

Opening salvo

A young girl Basmala, one of 13 civilians reported killed in a US cruise missile attack on September 23rd, 2014. (Via Syrian Network for Human Rights)

The first US airstrikes in Syria occurred on September 23rd 2014. According to locals in the town of Kafr Daryan, the target of the attack that night were members of the Syrian affiliate of al Qaeda, known then as Jabhat al-Nusra or Nusra Front. Along with a number of fighters, at least 13 civilians reportedly died, including a husband, wife and their two children.

US officials said the cruise missiles that landed in Kafr Daryan were intended for a special cell within the Nustra Front planning attacks abroad, which they dubbed “the Khorasan Group.” The bombings marked the start of intermittent strikes against al Qaeda in Syria that have continued ever since, in parallel to the better-known and much larger coalition campaign against the Islamic State.

In 2014, the United States took pains to make clear that it was not striking all Nusra Front targets, but instead those it identified as intent on attacking the West. Likewise, it maintained that those it struck were not focused on defeating Assad. Less than two months after the Kafr Daryan attack, U.S. forces carried out fresh strikes against five more targets in Idlib. In a news release sent out the day after one of those strikes in November, CENTCOM stressed that it was only hitting the Khorasan Group, which it defined as “a network of Nusrah Front and al-Qa’ida core extremists who share a history of training operatives, facilitating fighters and money, and planning attacks against U.S. and Western targets.”

“These strikes … did not target the Nusrah Front as a whole,” the US military release continued. “They were directed at the Khorasan Group whose focus is not on overthrowing the Assad regime or helping the Syrian people.”

Likely remnant of a cruise missile fired at targets in Kafr Daryan. (Via Amnesty International).

Wider goals

More than two years later, the United States no longer refers to the Khorasan Group, whose core members have allegedly been killed. Though Jabhat al-Nusra renamed itself Jabhat Fateh al-Sham and claims to have split with al Qaeda in July 2016, the United States continues to target its fighters, insisting that any changes have been merely cosmetic and the group’s links to the international terrorist group remain intact. James Clapper, then Director of National Intelligence, called the Nusra name change a “PR move … to create the image of being more moderate.”

A UN counterterrorism official who spoke with Airwars gave a similar account: “It was just a rebranding. … [T]hey thought ‘oh no, a lot of people don’t like us because they think we were associated with al Qaeda.’” Since January, Jabhat Fatah al-Sham operates under the umbrella group Hayat Tahrir al-Sham, which it founded, and remains headquartered in Idlib.

A former senior official in the Obama White House told Airwars that the administration began paying greater attention to the Nusra Front in early 2016, and by the fall had devoted more assets to combating it, including drones that had previously been used against the Islamic State. “That was predicated by a series of intelligence products that frankly spooked a lot of people,” the official said. “While the national focus had been on [the Islamic State], and the fear had been on an [Islamic State] attack, the sense was the near-term threat to the homeland and that threat that had the potential to grow the most in the coming months and years was posed by Nusra.”

In November 2016, the Washington Post reported that the White House had by now given the Pentagon “wider authority and additional intelligence-collecting resources to go after al-Nusra’s broader leadership.” Significantly, Obama ordered that all Nusra leaders — not just so-called legacy members of al Qaeda or those involved in planning external attacks — were to be targeted, an account confirmed to Airwars by two former Obama administration officials.

Current and former US officials insist that the recent increase in strikes is in large part a product of greater intelligence and knowledge of plots. But this period, beginning last fall, also coincides with significant and strategic gains made by the Syrian regime and its allies — ultimately to the point that officials in Washington no longer assumed Assad would be pushed from power. The Obama doctrine of supporting certain opposition groups against the Assad government did not yield the desired results, particularly after Russia intervened in Syria in late 2015. It was only a year later, when the opposition appeared to have little chance of taking the entire country, that the United States significantly escalated its campaign against al Qaeda. As one administration official told the Washington Post, the White House could no longer go along with what it called “‘a deal with the devil’ whereby the United States held its fire against al-Nusra.”

“Before, the Americans would have to really sell the idea of targeting opponents of Bashar al-Assad, or groups that were fighting [him],” according to Hassan Hassan, senior fellow at the Tahrir Institute for Middle East Policy. With the fall of Aleppo in late 2016, he added, “[T]here was a tacit understanding that the game was over.”

Unclear authorization

All US military strikes against alleged al Qaeda in Syria have been carried out under the 2001 Authorization for Use of Military Force (AUMF) passed by Congress just days after the 9/11 attacks. The Pentagon says the same is true of the anti-Islamic State campaign, even though that group broke with and has fought al Qaeda. In Syria, the United States makes use of an expansive definition of so-called associated forces of al Qaeda — a phrase that was not included in the AUMF, but that has been adopted by the Pentagon and successive U.S. administrations. More than 15 years after 9/11, it could now apply to thousands of fighters in the Syrian civil war, many of whom may care little about striking the West.

Michael Hayden, former head of both the National Security Agency and CIA — and a prominent backer of drone warfare — says the AUMF is no longer fit for its original purpose. And he faults Congress for failing to redefine these war powers earlier. “The public debate seems to have moved well beyond it,” he told Airwars in a telephone interview. “There is no political space in which to have this discussion right now with everything else that is going on.”

In January, the Pentagon issued a news release following two attacks in Idlib targeting senior al Qaeda figures that may have subtly reflected the expanded nature of the campaign. “We are confident,” the release said, “these strikes will degrade al-Qaida’s ability to direct operations in Syria.” Jabhat Fateh al-Sham is estimated to have well over 10,000 fighters, so a campaign against the entire organization would be radically different from the initial effort to disrupt a cell of al Qaeda terrorists planning international attacks.

In response to a question from Airwars, Pentagon spokesman Eric Pahon insisted that “not much has changed,” and pointed out that the same January release still referenced al Qaeda’s commitment “to carrying out terrorist attacks against the United States and West.”

Asked to clarify what groups — and how many individuals — are now within the scope of the American campaign, the Pentagon said it would not release intelligence information and only stated, “We do target al Qaeda in Syria.”

Remains of a vehicle targeted by the Coalition in Idlib on October 17th 2016. The attack also reportedly injured three civilians (via Step News)

Insurgents vs. terrorists

Are elements in al Qaeda’s Syrian affiliate planning attacks abroad? Those who have watched the civil war for years say “yes,” but that it’s complicated.

“Intelligence suggests that al Qaeda in northwest Syria is engaged in putting together the infrastructure, recruiting necessary fighters and putting in place a plan that could one day be activated to conduct attacks,” says Charles Lister, a senior fellow at the Middle East Institute and author of The Syrian Jihad.

Lister doubts, however, that this planning is occurring within the context of Hayat Tahrir al-Sham, the umbrella group that includes a broad subset of the Syrian opposition. He and other analysts now worry that the United States risks sparking a war with the broader anti-Assad movement.

“The announcement of Hayat Tahrir al-Sham [HTS] almost certainly means that large new sections of north Syria’s rebels are considered al Qaeda-linked, and thus included in that target set,” said Sam Heller, a fellow at the Century Foundation who researches the Syrian civil war. “And with every passing day, HTS assimilates more of the northern opposition. Whether the United States will strike them remains to be seen.”

In that context, the March 16th strike on part of a religious complex in the town of al-Jinah has raised deep concerns — not only for its high civilian toll, but for the precedents it sets for the type of targets the United States is willing to hit. While locals described the building as a recently constructed mosque, US officials insisted to Airwars that the mosque was not hit, which they said was a short distance from the actual target.

Residents, however, say the larger structure that was struck was also a part of the mosque complex — a description supported by open-source imagery — where more than 200 people were meeting for religious teaching. Casualty figures have varied, from 37 to more than 60 victims.

A post-strike image released by the Pentagon. US officials claim the structure hit was not a mosque — locals say otherwise.

Pahon told Airwars that the airstrike target was “an Al Qaeda in Syria meeting location … killing several terrorists. Intelligence indicated that Al Qaida leaders used the partially-constructed community meeting hall as a gathering place, and as a place to educate and indoctrinate Al Qaida fighters.”

Discussing the strike, the UN counterterrorism official said the sheer number of people in the building meant that regardless of the presence of al Qaeda leaders, the strike was reckless — reminiscent of previous airstrikes since 9/11 that have worsened animosity toward the United States.

“It’s precisely the wrong approach to try to prevent terrorists in the future,” the official said.

Photo shows the remnants of a bomb used in the airstrike on the ‘Umar ibn Al-Khaṭṭāb mosque in the rebel-held village of al-Jinā, w-Aleppo. pic.twitter.com/aGsqMjcWIJ

— Sakir Khader (@sakirkhader) March 16, 2017

Charles Lister, who contends that the United States has thus far been effective at striking a balance in Syria by only going after senior al Qaeda leadership, said no evidence had yet emerged of any targets that warranted the al-Jinah strike.

“That nothing at all has come out still to this point strengthens the accusation that this may have been a case of mistaken target selection,” he said. “Whatever the case, the damage is done — as far as genuinely moderate Syrians within the opposition are concerned, the al-Jinah incident demonstrated that there was little difference between the US and the Assad regime or Russia.”

From Obama to Trump

The last unilateral strike of the Obama administration underscored just how much the target set in Syria had expanded during his presidency. On January 19th, a US Air Force B-52 bomber — along with other aircraft including drones — struck west of Aleppo, reportedly killing more than 100 fighters in what the Pentagon described as an al Qaeda training camp. It was one of a number of strikes that month, which the United States claimed had between them killed at least 150 terrorists.

Heller said it appeared the camp was being used jointly by Jabhat Fateh al-Sham and a smaller number of fighters from a separate group called the Nour al-Din al-Zinki Movement. The two groups had grown steadily closer during the past year; a little more than a week after the strike, Zinki would officially join Hayat Tahrir al-Sham.

This expanding definition of which groups represent legitimate targets for a strike may be poised to grow even further during the Trump administration. The new American president, who during the election campaign promised to “bomb the shit” out of the Islamic State, has asked the Pentagon to consider relaxing the rules of engagement in Syria and Iraq as part of the campaign against that group. This month, Trump authorized the CIA to carry out its own drone strikes in Syria.

HUGE news via source:

Al-Qaeda deputy leader Abu al-Khayr al-Masri has been killed in a U.S drone strike near Al-Mastoumeh in #Idlib. pic.twitter.com/RORT6sU8Sj

— Charles Lister (@Charles_Lister) February 26, 2017

Images posted after a US strike which reportedly killed senior al-Qaeda leader Abu al-Khayr al-Masri. Subsequent reports indicated the strike was carried out by the CIA.

For the moment, US military personnel remain mostly focused on the Islamic State and the dual campaigns to capture Mosul and Raqqa. Recent weeks have seen the highest reported civilian casualties of those operations. In March alone, more than 1,700 civilian casualty allegations have been lodged against the US-led coalition in both Iraq and Syria. Many of these incidents are contested, but a number of deadly strikes, including a raid in west Mosul that reportedly left more than 100 dead, have raised serious questions about how Coalition strikes are approved.

The White House has not said whether it will free up even more resources to attack al Qaeda’s Syrian affiliate with a wider air war. That said, the campaign shows every sign of continuing to grow. In Yemen, the Trump administration and the Pentagon have already overseen an unprecedented increase in airstrikes, targeting what they claim are al Qaeda militants — a signal, perhaps, of their intent to pursue the group with greater intensity in Syria and elsewhere.

But as in Yemen, progress has been fleeting. As the Assad regime’s hand has strengthened, so has Jabhat Fateh al-Sham’s. The United States, in effect, is escalating its campaign against al Qaeda only when the group has achieved an outsized representation in a diminished opposition. The war — a different front, but part of a 16-year-old campaign — may just be beginning.

“Hayat Tahrir al-Sham is much stronger than people think,” Hassan said. “They are more organized than other groups. They are in tune with the local sentiment, they know people want to focus on Bashar al-Assad. … It is very similar to the beginning of the ISIS war.”

Coalition and Iraqi forces not adequately protecting Mosul civilians, says Amnesty

Published

March 28, 2017

Written by

Samuel Oakford

Web link

In a blistering new report, Amnesty International has accused so-called Islamic State, the US-led Coalition and Iraqi forces of failing adequately to protect hundreds of thousands of civilians still trapped in Mosul. Airstrikes in particular are singled out for criticism: “Evidence gathered on the ground in East Mosul points to an alarming pattern of US-led coalition airstrikes which have destroyed whole houses with entire families inside,” notes Amnesty’s Donatella Rovera following a visit to the war-torn city.

“The high civilian toll suggests that coalition forces leading the offensive in Mosul have failed to take adequate precautions to prevent civilian deaths, in flagrant violation of international humanitarian law.”

Amnesty’s report is mostly focused on East Mosul, which was finally liberated in January. Yet the campaign to capture the west of the city – which began on February 19th – is exacting an even higher toll among non-combatants.

Identical twins Ali and Rakan Thamer Abdulla were among at least 101 civilians killed in a major incident in West Mosul on March 17th-18th, Airwars has learned. Their father and as many as 23 other family members also died with the twins at Al Jadida, in one of the worst losses of civilian life so far recorded in the grinding war against so-called Islamic State (ISIL).

The US-led Coalition has now said it carried out airstrikes on March 17th “at the location corresponding to allegations of civilian casualties” and is investigating. Five international allies regularly bomb at Mosul alongside the Iraq Air Force – the US, Britain, France, Australia and Belgium – and it is presently unclear which nation or nations carried out the confirmed strikes at Al Jadida.

Complicating matters further, there are also reports that Iraqi artillery struck nearby, and that ISIL may additionally have been involved. Some locals say that airstrikes set off a secondary explosion – possibly a carbomb or fuel truck – that then caused buildings to collapse in Al Jadida.

Reporter Anthony Lloyd of the London Times – who recently visited the scene – told Airwars he believed there may have been two or three related casualty events at Al Jadida over a short period of time, adding to the confusion.

Many of those who died at Al Jadida perished alongside their kin. Entire families had gathered in house basements, which they hoped would afford them some protection from the ferocious air and artillery barrage targeting ISIL forces in the neighbourhood on March 17th-18th. Instead entire rows of houses collapsed, entombing those below.

Pictures posted to social media showed the twins, Ali and Rakan Thamer Abdulla performing at competitions and smiling with their family. The Facebook page for Gym Egypt – a large Arab bodybuilding site – posted a short note about Ali and Rakan, calling them “heroes of Iraq.” The twins were the son of Haj Thamer Abdulla, who according to local reports was also killed along with his sons and daughters – numbering 26 family members in all.

Other victims of the al Jadida disaster named in local reports include 12 members of the family of Khadr Kaddawi; 11 members of Basem al-Muhzam’s family; and 30 civilians from the Sinjari family.

Twins Ali and Rakan Thamer Abdullah, two popular local bodybuilders who were slain in western Mosul. Image courtesy of Iraqoon Agency.

‘We are investigating the incident’

Where responsibility lies for at Al Jadida is still unclear. On March 26th, CENTCOM commander General Joseph Votel said “we are investigating the incident to determine exactly what happened and will continue to take extraordinary measures to avoid harming civilians.” CENTCOM chief spokesperson Colonel John Thomas later told Airwars that the US was reviewing some 700 videos captured by aircraft in Mosul on several days around March 17th.

Despite reports suggesting that its artillery may also have hit the street, the Iraqi military has blamed ISIL for the deaths, saying that 61 bodies had been recovered at the site of a booby-trapped house, which it described as “completely destroyed.” The statement added that “there is no hole or indication that was subjected to an air strike.”

That account strongly contradicted much field reporting and the accounts of other officials. A provincial health official, for instance, told Reuters that wide swaths of the neighborhood were destroyed in fighting. “Civil defense has extracted and buried 160 bodies up to this moment,” said the official. Earlier, Iraqi civil defense had reported at least 137 bodies were recovered. On March 27th, the Iraqi Civil Defense Department cited an even larger figure of 531 victims recovered from the Al Jadida neighborhood.

Pictures from the neighborhood showed dozens of bodies being buried in mass graves, wrapped in blue tarpaulins. Marcus Yam, a photographer for the LA Times, filmed a woman, Turkya Azudin, watching corpses being pulled from the rubble. Ms Azudin told him she had lost 18 members of her family.

To what extent Coalition airstrikes were responsible for more than 100 deaths at Al Jadida – either directly, or via secondary explosions – may also contain clues on why civilians are now more at risk on the battlefield. Though the Pentagon denies that its rules of engagement have been changed since Donald Trump took office, Iraqi officials have said it is now easier to call in US and Coalition airstrikes in western Mosul. In December, Coalition leaders also made the decision to allow lower level commanders the authority to call in airstrikes – but claimed these would still face the same scrutiny.

https://twitter.com/samueloakford/status/846764385301344257

“Based on lessons learned during phase I of the Iraqi security forces liberation of East Mosul, the CJTF-OIR commander delegated approval authority for certain strikes to battlefield commanders to provide better responsiveness to the Iraqi security forces when and where they needed it on the battlefield,” Coalition spokesman Col. Joseph Scrocca told Airwars. “This is not a change to rules of engagement, but merely a procedural change.”

“What you see now is the result of fighting an evil enemy in a dense urban environment where ISIS is using civilians as human shields, using homes as fighting positions, schools as weapons storage facilities, and mosques and hospitals as bases for its terrorist operations,” added Scrocca.

Whatever the semantics, the reality on the ground is that civilians are at greater risk of harm. Across Iraq and Syria, Airwars has monitored claims of more than 1,200 civilian fatalites tied to Coalition activity during March alone. That level of allegations is on a par with some of the most intense periods of Russian activity in Syria during 2016.

This scene will haunt me for a while: Turkya Azudin watches workers pull out corpses from her home and count relatives she had lost: 18 pic.twitter.com/ig3sInm5Mp

— Marcus Yam 文火 (@yamphoto) March 25, 2017

400,000 still trapped

In Iraq’s second largest city, a perfect storm now places civilians in extreme danger. Iraqi security forces have set up military positions in residential areas as the assault advances, drawing enemy fire while launching their own rounds – at times indiscriminate – into some of the most densely populated areas of Mosul. US-led airstrikes have hit some of these same neighbourhoods, along with ground-launched artillery, rocket and mortar strikes. Also on the ground, so-called Islamic State fighters routinely put civilians at risk by placing snipers on top of residential buildings, or by deploying explosives or truck bombs near civilian buildings.

According to the most recent United Nations estimate more than 400,000 civilians still remain trapped in a relatively small area of West Mosul. Given the intensity of the battle, high civilian casualties are inevitable. As one US Apache helicopter pilot said in a recent interview, “I can’t see into houses.”

“We have been trying to follow the issue of airstrikes and its impact on civilians – it is happening, and we have advised the government that conducting airstrikes in densely populated areas will necessarily result in civilian casualties, particularly given ISILs use of human shields which sources in Mosul and people leaving the area have confirmed,” said Francesco Motta, director of the UN’s Human Rights Office (HRO) in Iraq.

“Multiple sources have reported to HRO that ISIL have been deliberately locking families and civilians in their houses and placing offensive positions on the rooftops etc, in order to ensure serious casualties, and has been forcibly transferring people within western Mosul for this purpose. HRO has also received reports of civilians used as human shields being tied up to cars and used in public parades in areas of western Mosul under ISIL control.”

Amnesty International has also strongly criticised ISIL’s abuse of civilians in its latest report. But it says this does not excuse Coalition or Iraqi military actions which also place civilians at risk: “IS shamefully resorts to using civilians as human shields, a serious violation of the laws of war that amounts to a war crime. In a densely populated residential area, the risks for the civilian population become enormous. However, the IS’s use of human shields does not absolve Iraqi and coalition forces from their obligation not to launch disproportionate attacks,” says Donatella Rovera. Whatever ISIL’s tactics, it appears certain that hundreds of civilians have died this month alone as a result of incoming fire from Iraqi and Coalition forces. International and local media are uncovering ever more civilian casualty incidents. The Guardian found survivors of a March 22nd strike in Mosul that left at least 15 civilians dead. With so many major incidents across the city that week, the family’s plight had never been publicly reported at the time.

The question facing Coalition and Iraqi commanders – whatever their official rules of engagement or combat guidelines – is how many civilian deaths they are prepared to inflict in order to defeat ISIL at Mosul. There are already warnings of a hollow victory if the cost is too high. As Amnesty notes, “The civilian population has borne the brunt of the battle to recapture Mosul, with all sides displaying a chilling indifference to the devastating suffering caused to the city’s civilians.”

According to Amnesty International, 16 people were killed ‘in a Coalition strike’ at this location in Hay al- Mazaraa, East Mosul, on March 13th 2017

As claims escalate under Trump, Airwars tracks 1,000th alleged Coalition civilian casualty event

Published

March 17, 2017

Written by

Samuel Oakford

Web link

Following an unprecedented increase in claims, researchers at Airwars have tracked their 1,000th alleged civilian casualty event tied to reported Coalition strikes in Iraq and Syria. Recent evidence indicates that in both countries, civilian casualties rose during the last months of the Obama administration and are now accelerating further under the presidency of Donald Trump – suggesting possible key changes in US rules of engagement which are placing civilians at greater risk.

The 1,000th alleged incident monitored by Airwars researchers took place in Raqqa governorate, where intense Coalition airstrikes have seen more than 600 munitions dropped in the first two months of the year alone.

On the night of March 11th-12th, at least 17 civilians in Kasrat Al Faraj were reportedly killed by a Coalition attack. Several local reports said that those killed were sheltering inside a building after being displaced by recent fighting, and that many were women and children. On March 14th, the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights reported that the death toll had risen to “22 at least, including 6 children under the age of eighteen and 7 women citizens.” Another report from Syria News Desk indicated there were two raids – one on two schools “hosting displaced people” and another near the “the scientific research area southeast of Raqqa city.”

The 1,000th alleged incident coincides with a recent spike in civilian casualty allegations. Airwars best estimates suggest the US-led air campaign against so-called Islamic State has so far killed at least 2,590 civilians in Iraq and Syria since 2014. That year, Airwars tracked 62 reported civilian casualty incidents. In 2015, the first full year of attacks, researchers monitored 261 allegations. By 2016 that figure had risen to 454 cases.

The intensity of strikes in 2017 – notably around Raqqa and Mosul – has no precedent. To March 15th, a record 245 alleged Coalition civilian casualty events have been monitored by Airwars – roughly three events a day. At this pace, the number of alleged Coalition incidents this year could surpass 800.

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Intense fighting

Much of the recent casualty reporting is linked to parallel campaigns against ISIL at both Mosul and Raqqa. In Iraq’s second city, hundreds of civilians have been reported killed in just the first few weeks of March, as Iraqi Security Forces backed by Coalition air and artillery strikes attempt to dislodge ISIL fighters from the densely-packed western half of the city. Media reports have described the battle to oust ISIL as “reducing western Mosul to rubble.” Since the start of operations in the western half of the city on February 19th, almost 100,000 people have fled Mosul according to the International Organization for Migration.

Around Raqqa – where almost unreported the Coalition has bombed every day during 2017 – researchers at Airwars have so far graded as credible 43 of 99 reported civilian casualty incidents this year. Those 43 events are estimated to have claimed the lives of between 147 and 207 civilians. All but eleven of these 43 credible reported incidents around Raqqa have taken place during Donald Trump’s presidency.

Overall, as many as 9,200 civilian deaths have been alleged from 19,000 Coalition airstrikes. Airwars employs a strict grading system when evaluating these allegations. Only those incidents that have at least two credible sources and are accompanied by reported Coalition strikes in the near vicinity are assessed as “fair” – such as the 43 Raqqa incidents. Around 47% of the over 1,000 alleged civilian casualty incidents since 2014 meet this threshold, or have instead been confirmed by the Coalition as having killed or injured civilians. Other allegations contain conflicting reporting; are single sourced; or have been discounted, for example because reported civilians turned out to be combatants.

While the Coalition’s estimate of the civilians it has killed – 220 – is less than ten percent of Airwars’ baseline estimates, it has over the past year significantly increased the number of incidents under investigation.

Yet as of January 31st 2017 according to a senior official, the Coalition had only provisionally assessed or investigated 319 alleged civilian casualty events in total – just 36% of the total claimed incidents tracked by Airwars to that date. Though the Coalition has devoted more resources to its investigations – and engaged with outside monitoring – the torrent of casualty reports over recent months appears likely to further overwhelm military investigators. Additionally, there is the question of accountability for the US’s 12 Coalition allies, none of which have admitted to involvement in a single civilian death.

“Both the Coalition and CENTCOM have stepped up their investigations into civilian casualty allegations over the past year,” says Airwars director Chris Woods. “Unfortunately, these efforts have not kept pace with the rising tide of civilian casualty allegations being leveled against the Coalition. With two thirds of all claims not even assessed yet, any Coalition claims of low civilian casualties need to be treated with significant caution.”

#MOSUL_ALERT: 16,229 families (97,374 individuals), displaced from #West_Mosul in last 19days btw Feb 25 & March 15, as tracked by @DTM_IOM. pic.twitter.com/zLNRJYlfVd

— IOM Iraq (@IOMIraq) March 15, 2017

Around 100,000 civilians have so far fled the fighting in West Mosul

Looser rules of engagement

In late January President Trump requested a new plan from the US military to tackle ISIL, in which he called for “recommended changes to any United States rules of engagement and other United States policy restrictions that exceed the requirements of International law regarding the use of force against ISIS.”

During his campaign for the presidency, Trump went further, explicitly threatening to target the families of ISIL fighters. “They are using them as shields,” he said in November 2015. “But we are fighting a very politically correct war. And the other thing is with the terrorists, you have to take out their families.”

In short, Trump has been demanding that the US military consider dropping many of the restrictions which help protect civilian lives on the battlefield. His January request could open the door for US military planners to prepare attacks that may be expected to – and indeed do – kill more civilians.

When discussing civilian deaths, many in the US military highlight recent developments in Afghanistan, where generals concluded after almost a decade of conflict that rising civilian casualties were undermining the NATO mission there, and proving an effective recruiting tool for the Taliban. Reforms were introduced via directives including the creation of a civilian tracking cell; more stringent targeting rules; and a top down emphasis on civilian protection as a mission critical concern. The measures by no means ended civilian casualties, but casualties caused by international airstrikes dropped steeply between 2008 and 2013.

In that context, Trump’s request “flies in the face of everything that was done in Afghanistan,” one former senior military intelligence officer who served in the country told Airwars.

In Afghanistan “IHL [International humanitarian law] was your lowest standard and then you are going up from there, and this is like IHL is your highest standard and the goal is how close to the chalk line can you get,” said the officer. “That’s really fucked up.”

“The question that’s out there is to what extent has any relaxation of rules of engagement or restrictions based on civcas been put in place by the new administration,” they added. “I don’t know – clearly we have reporting on an increase in civcas [in Iraq and Syria]. To some extent that’s going to be driven by high-op tempo in urban areas – but the US also has a very long history of doing that kind of stuff very well in Afghanistan with minimal civilian casualties – so it begs the question, what is different?”

There are signs elsewhere – in the US’s unilateral campaign against alleged al Qaeda linked targets in Syria – that a higher tolerance for civilian casualties may be emerging. As Airwars first reported on March 16th, US aircraft bombed what was described as an al Qaeda “meeting place” – adjacent to what officials knew to be a mosque in rural western Aleppo. At least 42 people, mostly civilians, were killed, according to the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights. Parts of the mosque were also destroyed.

Exclusive: US Says it Carried Out Deadly Strike that Hit an Aleppo Mosque https://t.co/Y45M05Dplz

— Airwars (@airwars) March 17, 2017

Should the US further loosen its rules of engagement in Coalition activities, the civilian toll from strikes in Raqqa and other parts of Syria and Iraq may worsen. Though it remains unclear if and when restrictions on civilian casualties may be lifted, an executive order signed by former President Obama in July 2016 setting out civilian protections could be in Trump’s crosshairs. Noting the recent rise in allegations, advocacy groups are steeling for the worst – but say it it isn’t clear yet what has been decided.

Higher casualties could result from a number of changes. Pentagon commanders might set the overall permissive risk for civilians far higher than has been seen so far in the 30-month war. Lower-ranking commanders may also be given authority to approve strikes where there is a risk of civilian casualties.

Since January, alleged Coalition civilian casualty events have been outpacing those of Russia. Initial data for March provides further evidence that civilian casualty allegations are both becoming more common under President Trump, and are likely to outrun Coalition efforts to track and investigate them.

Airwars recorded 59 separate civilian casualty allegations in Iraq and Syria during the first 15 days of March, for which researchers assessed that at least 117 civilians were likely killed. At least 36 civilians – and likely more – are estimated to have died in just the first 8 days of the month in Raqqa governorate.

The worst of these occurred on March 8th, in the east of Raqqa governorate. At least 14 civilians – including at least six children – were allegedly killed outside Al Blu Rashed village when a coalition strike reportedly hit a vehicle carrying them. The death toll was one of the few in recent months to garner wire reports – Associated Press, citing monitoring groups Syrian Observatory for Human Rights and Raqqa is Being Silently Slaughtered, reported at least 20 civilian deaths. A day earlier, several local outlets, including Smart News, reported that five civilians were killed and at least 10 injured by another Coalition airstrike in al Salhabiya village.

A man searches through the rubble following an alleged Coalition airstrike on Omar Al Mukhtar school in Al Tabaqa, February 16th (RBSS)

‘Strategically beneficial’

In a letter dated March 10th more than 30 former US officials wrote to US Defense Secretary Mattis, encouraging him to ensure continued civilian protections similar to those set out by the Obama administration.

“The United States has always put a strong premium on minimizing civilian harm in armed conflicts, both because it is the right thing to do and because doing so is strategically beneficial.,” the letter stated.

“You could certainly loosen the standards for civilian casualties such that the commanders have more authority to take certain actions and take greater risk, and go after targets that are particularly high value, but where there is a greater possibility of civilian casualties,” says Luke Hartig, a fellow at the New America and former Senior Director for Counterterrorism at the National Security Council. “But our military commanders also understand the ways civilian casualties can set back our overall efforts and I have full confidence they will continue to operate with the utmost professionalism and discrimination in the use of force.”

“From what we’ve seen publicly, this administration is still finding its footing, and we don’t yet know exactly how it will respond to incidents of civilian harm,” Marla Keenan, senior director of programs at the Center for Civilians in Conflict told Airwars. Keenan added that it may be difficult to know if and when policy guidelines are officially changed. But President Trump – who during the campaign promised to “bomb the shit” out of ISIL – has indicated a willingness to escalate US airstrikes around the world, including most recently in Yemen, where the US launched more than 40 attacks in a five day period.

“We’ll have to wait and see—watching closely but not jumping to conclusions,” said Keenan, referring to civilian casualty policy in Syria.

The bulk of Coalition civilian casualties in Iraq and Syria occurred during Obama’s presidency. As Airwars noted at the time, hundreds of civilians were likely killed across Iraq and Syria in the short period from October 17th 2016 (the start of Mosul operations) until Obama left office. However between January 20th when Donald Trump became president and March 15th, Airwars has tracked 173 new alleged Coalition civilian casualty events – with 1,214 to 1,859 claimed non-combatant fatalities between them. While many of these allegations have yet to be properly assessed, the tempo of reported civilian fatalites is clearly accelerating.

Rescuers retrieve victims from an alleged Coalition strike in al Tabaqa, Raqqa governorate on February 28th. Image courtesy of Raqqa is Being Slaughtered Silently.

Exclusive: US says it carried out deadly strike that hit Aleppo mosque

Published

March 16, 2017

Written by

Samuel Oakford

Web link

This article was updated on March 17th to reference new reports in Step News and the Washington Post.

Military officials have confirmed to Airwars that a strike in rural Aleppo which reportedly left dozens dead in and around a mosque was carried out by US aircraft.

The Syrian Observatory for Human Rights, a UK-based monitor, said that at least 42 people, mostly civilians, were killed in a strike that “targeted a mosque in al-Jinah village” in the western countryside of Aleppo on March 16th. “The death toll is expected to rise,” said the monitor.

Video posted by the White Helmets showed men being dug out from rubble at the site. Local activists told al Jazeera that the attack took place during evening prayer, when the mosque was full of “up to 300 people.” Other accounts put the death toll far higher.

Initial reporting was conflicting, including assertions that Russian forces or the Assad regime were to blame. Photographs reportedly from the site and posted on social media also appeared to depict weapons fragments similar to those found at previous US drone strikes in Syria.

Photo shows the remnants of a bomb used in the airstrike on the ‘Umar ibn Al-Khaṭṭāb mosque in the rebel-held village of al-Jinā, w-Aleppo. pic.twitter.com/aGsqMjcWIJ

— Sakir Khader (@sakirkhader) March 16, 2017

https://twitter.com/SyrianLense/status/842492968846180352

Airwars was initially told by US Central Command (CENTCOM) that a strike was carried out late on March 16th, but in Idlib governorate. That is where the bulk of US strikes against alleged al Qaeda-linked targets have taken place since 2014. The unilateral American campaign exists in parallel to operations conducted by the anti-ISIS Coalition. Strikes and reported civilian casualties from both have risen significantly since last fall.

However, a US official later clarified that the US raid in fact took place in the vicnity of al-Jinah village, which is located in western Aleppo governorate, just a few kilometers from the border with Idlib. CENTCOM spokesperson Maj. Josh Jacques said the target was “assessed to be a meeting place for al Qaeda, and we took the strike.”

“It happened to be across the street from where there is a mosque,” said Jacques. He said the mosque was not the target, and that it wasn’t hit directly. Both CENTCOM and the Pentagon told Airwars that they were further investigating the attack.

Videos identified by researchers at the citizen journalism outlet Bellingcat appeared to show parts of the mosque destroyed, while others remained upright.

Northern side of mosque has collapsed due to American airstrike, but largest part still standing. https://t.co/ak75roognl h/t @CT_operative pic.twitter.com/jM1CG2y8Ci

— Christiaan Triebert (@trbrtc) March 17, 2017

Citing local sources, the outlet Step News said the strikes hit a gathering known as a Dawah. A local group, reported Step “holds a meeting in one of their centres every Thursday which is attended by dozens of students of religious studies, sheikhs, sharia experts and fighters in the Islamic factions and civilians from the region.”

On March 17th, the Washington Post, citing a U.S. official, said that the attack “involved two Reaper drones, which fired four Hellfire missiles and dropped at least one 500-pound GPS-guided bomb.”

The death toll, which could not immediately be confirmed, appears to be at least the second largest ever from US strikes aimed at alleged al-Qaeda targets in Syria. On January 19th, more than 100 fighters gathered at a training camp in Idlib were reportedly killed in a raid that involved a B-52 bomber. Most of those killed were said to belong to the militant group Jabhat Fateh al-Sham.

Al Qaeda’s affiliate in Syria, Jabhat al Nusra, officially claimed to split with the terror group in July 2016, renaming itself Jabhat Fateh al-Sham. Since January 2017 it operates under the umbrella group Tahrir al-Sham. The US military carries out attacks against alleged al Qaeda targets under the same 2001 Authorization for Use of Military Force (AUMF) that Congress passed several days after the 9/11 attacks. The strikes employ an expansive definition of “associated forces” – a phrase not used in the AUMF, but which has been adopted by the Pentagon and successive US administrations. It could now apply to thousands of fighters in Syria.

Just days into March, hundreds of civilians already reported slain in West Mosul

Published

March 7, 2017

Written by

Samuel Oakford

Web link

Hundreds of civilians have allegedly been killed in western Mosul during the first week of March during battles to capture the city, according to reports monitored by Airwars.

Airwars has reviewed eleven separate incidents that occured over the first six days of the month, each of which was blamed – in part or wholly – on the Coalition by at least one source. Local reports allege that between 250 and 370 civilians were killed in these attacks. Four of these incidents have thus far been graded by researchers as fairly attributed, meaning there were two or more credible reports blaming the US-led alliance, and with Coalition airstrikes confirmed in the area. Those four incidents alone indicate between 71-79 civilian deaths.

https://twitter.com/PatrickOsgood/status/839030754080395264

News agencies and local monitors have also reported significant civilian casualties in west Mosul in recent days

The other events feature contesting reports that also blamed Iraqi forces or so-called Islamic State. Whoever the perpetrator, the reported upswing in civilian casualties in the first days of March serves as a bloody harbinger of the civilian toll in western Mosul. The right bank of the Tigres River was left by Iraqi forces for last, as it contains the bulk of Mosul’s civilian population and is far more densely settled than neighborhoods in the city’s east, which Iraqi security forces declared liberated in late January.

Iraq launched operations to capture western Mosul on February 19th – four months after it entered the eastern side. The UN estimated at the time that some 750,000 people remained in west Mosul, a figure that has only marginally diminished since then.

Thanon Alaa Younis, reported killed in Coalition airstrikes in the Farouk neighborhood on March 1st. Image courtesy of Mosul Ateka.

Civilian casualty incidents from airstrikes in western Mosul were already being reported during the campaign to liberate the east of the city, and continued into the last weeks of February. However the reported death toll appear to have escalated in March. (For reference, an analysis of civilian deaths in January can be read here).

One of the deadliest recent incidents occurred on March 1st, when a mosque used for shelter by displaced family was hit by several airstrikes. Ninevah Media Center reported more than 80 civilians were killed or wounded, while Mosul Eye put the number killed at “more than 50.” The outlet MNN attributed the attack to the Coalition, while Reuters cited three local eyewitnesses who blamed unidentified aircraft. One victim, identified as Thanon Alaa Younis, was listed by Mosul Ateka as among the dead.

On the same day, Airwars researchers monitored reports of at least four more civilians killed and 14 injured after airstrikes in the vicinity of Sha’aren Market. Reports did not attribute the strike.

On March 2nd several outlets – at least one of which cited ISIL affiliated media – reported that 20 civilians were killed and 18 wounded in a Coalition bombardment of west Mosul’s Shifa neighbourhood. Some reports said a strike hit a residential building. Also in west Mosul – this time in the Nabi Sheet neighbourhood – 14 civilians from three families were alleged killed by a Coalition airstrike that targeted what may have been a car bomb. FaceIraq identified one of the families as that of Nazim Abdul Rahman.

Though reports do conflict and are not always entirely clear, there are confirmed signs that the civilian toll in western Mosul has been massive. According to the UN’s humanitarian agency, more than 500 people escaping the city have been treated at “trauma stabilization points” for conflict-related injuries. The number of displaced also indicates a clear trend: In the week between February 27th and March 4th, the UN estimated that some 42,000 people were displaced fromn Mosul, including 13,350 on March 3rd alone.

The following day, March 4th, saw fresh attacks on west Mosul – centered this time in the Al Mahatta neighborhood – that allegedly left at least 36 civilians dead, including five children. Those estimates and associated images appeared to originate with ISIL-controlled media, though the incident was picked up by more than a half-dozen outlets. Iraqi Spring Media Center published extremely distressing photos, apparently taken from a video, that showed several dead toddlers lying in what appeared to be a hospital or morgue. Both the Coalition and Iraqi forces were blamed for the attack.

Children reportedly killed in a March 4th strike in western Mosul. Photo is a screenshot of a likely ISIL propaganda video that was archived by Iraqi Spring Media Group.

What may have been the deadliest incident in western Mosul to date occurred on March 5th, when local sources indicated that as many as 130 civilians were killed during an assault on a government compound in the Dawassa neighborhood. Both Coalition and Iraqi forces were cited for attacks, and several outlets reported that US Apache helicopters were involved. Images reportedly of the neighborhood that were posted to social media showed the area in ruins.

https://twitter.com/Moghred_Ninawa/status/838459085334974464

Sigtnificant damage is being reported locally in some west Mosul neighbourhoods

On March 6th, new reports indicated that between 25 and 33 imprisoned Iraqi police and security forces were killed by Coalition strikes near the central railway station. There were reports that the site of the attack had been used as a detention facility, and a number of ISIL fighters was also reported killed.

As Reuters also reported on March 6th, Iraqi officials now believe the fight in Mosul “will enter a more complicated phase in the densely populate old city.” The Iraqi military estimates that “several thousand” militants remain. Unless measures are taken to reduce civilian harm, death tolls similar to those seen in the first six days of March may well continue for weeks to come.

▲ A March 2017 airstrike during the battle for Mosul against Islamic State. While the US-led Coalition has admitted almost 1,400 civilian deaths during the war, European allies have remained almost silent about their own responsibility. (Via Reuters/ Alaa Al-Marjani)

Hundreds of civilians killed in Turkish capture of al-Bab, as Ankara eyes Kurdish-held Manbij

Published

February 24, 2017

Written by

Samuel Oakford

Web link

After more than three months of fighting, Turkish-backed Syrian rebels have captured central al-Bab from so-called Islamic State according to local reports.

Yet civilian deaths from airstrikes, artillery and ground combat in and around the town reportedly stretched into the hundreds, according to the United Nations. Considering al-Bab’s small size, this high toll raises concerns about further Turkish-led actions in northern Syria – where the US has supported Kurdish forces that Turkey now says it will next target.

As the administration of US President Donald Trump weighs whether to revamp American mlitary policy in Syria, and possible lower thresholds for civilian casualties, the threat of prolonged and bloodier confrontations grows.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lAbSQkGlOEo

A Smart News video depicts Turkish-backed FSA rebels following their February 23rd capture of al-Bab

Following heavy criticism from NATO ally Turkey, since mid-January the US-led Coalition launched nearly 50 strikes in support of Turkish forces fighting to capture al-Bab. The raids represented a distinct third front of Coalition activity after operations at Raqqa and Mosul – and added a volatile element to an already convoluted situation in the town.

By entering the fray, the Coalition also became the third international force bombing al-Bab, in addition to Turkey and Russia. On the ground, Turkish forces and allied opposition units battled ISIL.

Following news of ISIL’s withdrawal from al-Bab on February 23rd, Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan said Ankara’s Euphrates Shield operation would now continue towards Kurdish-held Manbij. That city lies to the east of Al-Bab and was captured in the summer of 2016 by Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF) backed by deadly Coalition air support. The presence of the predominantly Kurdish SDF in Manbij has been a point of tension for Turkey ever since. A January assessment conducted by the Washington Institute predicted that Turkey may apply the same ruthless techniques used in al-Bab at Manbij, “leaving Washington with the prospect of major civilian carnage.”

Turkish State TV enters Al-Bab following the FSA's seizure of the town pic.twitter.com/sBU1wtVMk0

— Ragıp Soylu (@ragipsoylu) February 23, 2017

North Syria increasingly chaotic

In late December, after the US initially balked at supporting Turkey’s unilateral move on al-Bab – preferring attention be paid to Raqqa instead – Ankara began cooperating with Russia to coordinate strikes around al-Bab. Whatever the level of cooperation, this was an unprecedented move for a NATO member, and increased pressure on the US to provide its own superior airpower.

The Obama administration had tried to maintain a delicate balance – and forestall an extended confrontation – between its treaty ally Turkey and the Kurdish People’s Protection Units (YPG) that fight under the SDF banner. Turkey accuses the YPG of being the Syrian branch of the Kurdistan Worker’s Party (PKK), a militant group waging a renewed campaign inside Turkey.

Abd al Jawwad Yassin (left), Mohammad the son of Abd al Sattar and a child, the daughter of Abd al Sattar (top), and Abd al Sattar Yassin. Reported killed killed in Beza’a city, east of al Bab. (picture courtesy of Al Bab al Hadath)

Both Turkey and the US consider the PKK a terrorist organization. The US, however has embedded special operation forces with the SDF, and has relied on the group to capture northern Syrian cities including Manbij. The Coalition has also backed SDF with hundreds of airstrikes in recent months around ISIL’s self-declared capital of Raqqa. In this climate, US CENTCOM told told Airwars as late as January 10th that there had been “no changes to existing US policy regarding support to the Turkish military in al-Bab,” and that American forces were not “conducting US airstrikes in or near Al-Bab.”

That stance changed just one week later, when the Coalition said that it had carried out its first strikes in the area on January 17th – just three days before US President Barack Obama left office. Since then, the Coalition launched at least 47 raids, according to daily strike reports. Those bombings supported an existing mix of Turkish air and artillery strikes, as well as regular Russian raids and a collage of ground forces – making the tracking and attributing of civilian casualties difficult. While it appears that Turkish airstrikes were primarily focused on the western part of the city – where its forces made slow progress – Coalition and Russian strikes were harder to pinpoint, and neither belligerent provides exact locations for where their weapons are released.

Airwars has monitored dozens of reported civilian casualty incidents in al-Bab since November 2016. Tellingly, reports often conflated Turkish and Coalition actions well before the US-led alliance was officially involved. Through January, the Coalition insisted that Ankara’s offensive was unilateral.

On December 9th, to take one example, reports indicated that at least 13 civilians were killed in al-Bab. Local accounts cited both the Coalition and Turkey, though most blamed Ankara. One local report described how all-Bab “came under aerial bombardment and heavy artillery… [by the] Turkish army,” leaving more than 20 dead from a single family. Three days later, on December 12th, 12 civilians including 6 children were reported killed, and local accounts blamed both Turkey and the Coalition.

Given Turkey’s official membership in the Coalition, it is not always clear if local reports mean to distinguish between the two entities. Since the official start of Coalition strikes in Janaury, that task has become even harder. Extending Euphrates Shield will likely create further contested reporting.

Airwars asked the Coalition how it split targets with Turkey. A spokesperson provided the following statement:

“The Coalition uses a variety of intelligence, reconnaissance, and surveillance to provide accurate information to intelligence centers, strike cells, pilots, and commanders. These information sources provide the Coalition with situational awareness and allow for research and target development on the enemy’s functional use of locations and structures.”

Fadel Abdul Ghany, director of the Syrian Network for Human Rights, says his organisation does attempt to separate Turkish and Coalition attacks based on certain clues.

“We do distinguish between them, and we do not consider them as one side – as if Turkey was a member of the coalition,” Abdul Ghany told Airwars. “It is hard,” he added, “but the international coalition strikes are more precise and more powerful.”

UN: more than 300 civilians slain in battle for al-Bab

The UN’s human rights office (OHCHR) has also been tracking events in al-Bab, and provided Airwars with data from December 2016 through February 17th 2017, just before the town fell. Matthias Behnke, head of OHCHR’s Syria Team said the team “received reports that about 300 civilians have been killed so far as a result of the offensive to retake al-Bab, primarily due to airstrikes but also from improvised explosive devises (IEDs).” The Syrian Observatory for Human Rights put the toll slightly higher, reporting that 353 civilians, including 87 children and 55 women had been killed between November 13th 2016 and February 20th, 2017. It blamed those deaths on Turkish airstrikes and artillery.

Alarmingly, Behnke said that their monitoring suggested that “at least 100 civilians have been killed in and around al-Bab town since February 1st.” A strike on February 8th, he noted, “allegedly killed at least 27 civilians and injured at least 30 others, many of them from the same family.”

According to the daily Coalition strike report for February 8th, “Near Al Bab, three strikes engaged two ISIL tactical units; destroyed two mortar systems, a VBIED, vehicle, and a tunnel entrance.” However, local reports monitored by Airwars blamed Turkey. Al Bab 24, for instance, blamed “Turkish air and artillery shelling” and provided an extensive list of civilians from several families. “The number of victims under the rubble is large and it hasn’t been possible to pull them all out due to heavy shelling,” the report added.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PpWkKy49_1c

ISIL proaganda video February 12th 2017 showing heavy damage to al Bab

On February 13th – when the Coalition reported no strikes – at least 15 civilians were allegedly killed in al-Bab. The Al Bab Coordination Committee provided the names of 17 people, including 5 women, which it said had perished. Syrian outlet Shaam News cited ISIL news reports which referred to “Turkish aircraft and aircraft of the international coalition” – reflecting the confusion over who exactly is bombing al-Bab. For locals caught up in the violence, there is often little difference. Worsening the plight of civilians, says the UN, are reports that militants have shot at residents of the city to prevent them from fleeing. “UN Human Rights Office received a number of reports of ISIL fighters shooting civilians trying to leave towards areas controlled by armed opposition groups,” said Behnke. But the UN has also received reports that Turkish-backed rebels have “shot civilians who are mistaken for ISIL elements, and a few reports of Government forces positioned south of al-Bab firing on civilians who are trying to leave towards al Raqqa.”

Given the complicated politics of the al-Bab operation and its high civilian toll from Turkish attacks, it is also unclear the extent to which non-US Coalition members took part in bombings there. The Coalition would not provide a breakdown of what countries have bombed al-Bab, but the UK told Airwars it carried out one attack during 2017, on January 18th. The UK Ministry of Defense declined to comment on whether it planned to launch any further military actions in the vicinity of al-Bab. While the Coalition’s task is more straightforward in Iraq where it cooperates with the government, the complexities of Syria may make it more difficult for Coalition members to see eye to eye.

The latest civilian casualty incident in al-Bab monitored by the UN took place on February 20th; Behnke said it initially appeared that “tens” of people had been killed. Airwars researchers tracked reports of civilian casualties on this day, when both the Coalition and Turkey reported strikes. The Turkish military said it had bombed or shelled more than 250 targets in al-Bab between February 19th and 21st. The Coalition meanwhile reported that “Near Al Bab, three strikes engaged two ISIS tactical units, destroyed four ISIS-held buildings, and damaged an ISIS-held building.”

Disproportionate toll

If 300 civilians or more were killed in al-Bab since December, it would represent a major toll proportionate to Raqqa and Mosul, where hundreds of thousands more civilians continue to reside, and where the Coalition is now releasing thousands of bombs each month. Al-Bab is much smaller than both cities, and is defended by at most several hundred ISIL fighters – possibly fewer than the number of civilians killed. The Coalition was but one actor in al-Bab – but it was unclear to what extent they are communication with the Turks with an eye to protecting civilians.

Reports in the days before al-Bab’s fall indicate the Trump administration may be willing to lessen support to the SDF, favoring long-term stability with Turkey. According to Aaron Stein, senior fellow at the Atlantic Council, that decision to appease the Turks could prolong the campaign to take Raqqa. Indeed, Turkey has made clear it intends to move not towards Raqqa, but Manbij.

The flash points, however, would be al-Bab, Manbij, and Tabqah. In this scenario,” Stein wrote in a recent assessment of US-Turkish interests in northern Syria. “Washington would have to assume the risk of Kurdish-Turkish escalation in favor of the broader effort to appease Ankara while also ousting the Islamic State from Raqqa with a Turkish-backed force.”

Choosing Turkey over the better-poised SDF could stretch the fight for Raqqa into 2018 – ample time for hundreds more airstrikes.

▲ Secretary of Defense Jim Mattis meets with Turkish Minister of National Defense Fikri Isik at the NATO Headquarters in Brussels, Belgium, Feb. 15, 2017. (DOD photo by U.S. Air Force Tech. Sgt. Brigitte N. Brantley)

US promised it wouldn’t use Depleted Uranium in Syria. But then it did.

Published

February 14, 2017

Written by

Samuel Oakford

Web link

Officials have confirmed that the US military – despite vowing not to use controversial Depleted Uranium (DU) weapons on the battlefield in Iraq and Syria – fired thousands of rounds of such munitions during two high-profile raids on oil trucks in Islamic State-controlled Syria in late 2015. The air assaults mark the first confirmed use of this armament since the 2003 Iraq invasion, when hundreds of thousands of rounds were fired, leading to outrage among local communities which alleged that toxic remnants caused both cancer and birth defects.

US Central Command (CENTCOM) spokesman Major Josh Jacques told Airwars and Foreign Policy that 5,265 armor-piercing 30mm rounds containing depleted uranium (DU) were shot from Air Force A-10 fixed-wing aircraft on November 16th and 22nd 2015, destroying about 350 vehicles in the country’s eastern desert.

30mm fire hits targets on November 16th in Syria. Image captured from CJTF video release.

Earlier in the campaign, both Coalition and US officials said the ammunition had not and would not be used in anti-Islamic State operations. In March 2015, Coalition spokesman John Moore said, “US and Coalition aircraft have not been and will not be using depleted uranium munitions in Iraq or Syria during Operation Inherent Resolve.” Later that month, a Pentagon representative told War is Boring that A-10s deployed in the region would not have access to armor-piercing ammunition containing DU because the Islamic State didn’t possess the tanks it is designed to penetrate.

It remains unclear if the November 2015 strikes occurred near populated areas. In 2003, hundreds of thousands of rounds were shot in densely settled areas during the American invasion, leading to deep resentment and fear among Iraqi civilians and – later – anger at the highest levels of government in Baghdad. In 2014, in a UN report on DU, the Iraqi government expressed “its deep concern over the harmful effects” of the material. DU weapons, it said, “constitute a danger to human beings and the environment” and urged the United Nations to conduct in-depth studies on their effects. Such studies of DU have not yet been completed, and most scientists and doctors say as a result there is still very limited credible “direct epidemiological evidence” connecting DU to negative health effects.

The potential popular blowback from using DU, however, is very real. While the United States insists it has the right to use the weapon, experts have called the decision to use the munition in such quantities against targets it wasn’t designed for — such as tanks — peculiar at best.

The US raids in 2015 were part of “Tidal Wave II” — an operation aimed at crippling infrastructure that the Islamic State relied on to sell millions of dollars’ worth of oil. The Pentagon said the November 16th attacks happened in the early morning near Al-Bukamal, a city in the governorate of Deir Ezzor near the border with Iraq, and destroyed 116 tanker trucks. Though the Coalition said the strikes occurred entirely in Syrian territory, both sides of the frontier were completely under the control of the militant group at the time. Any firing of DU in Iraqi territory would have had far greater political repercussions, given the anger over its previous use there. The November 16th video below shows tankers hit first by larger ordnances, before others are engulfed in sparks and are ripped apart by fire from 30mm cannons.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZQkG-RWxFfY

Video of the second DU run on November 22nd destroyed what is described as 283 “Daesh Oil trucks” in the desert between Al-Hasakeh and Deir Ezzor — both capitals of governorates of the same names.

The use of DU in Syria was first reported by this author in IRIN News last October. CENTCOM and the US Air Force at first denied it was fired, then offered differing accounts of what happened, including an admission in October that the weapon had been used. However, the dates confirmed by CENTCOM at that point were off by several days. It is now clear that the munitions were used in the most publicized of the Tidal Wave II attacks.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8IC-GzY2SRw

Armoured targets

Depleted uranium is left over from the enrichment of uranium 235. It is exceptionally hard, and has been employed by militaries both to penetrate armoured targets and to reinforce potential targets like tanks against enemy fire. Though less radioactive than the original uranium, DU is toxic and is considered by the US Environmental Protection Agency to be a “radiation health hazard when inside the body.”

The most likely way for such intake to occur is through the inhalation of small particles near where a munition is used. But doctors and anti-nuclear activists alike say there hasn’t been enough research done to prove the precise health effects and exposure thresholds for humans. This lack of comprehensive research on illnesses and health outcomes in post-conflict areas where DU was used has led to a proliferation of assumptions and theories about DU’s potential to cause birth defects and cancer. Firing rounds near civilian populations also has a powerful psychological effect, causing distress and severe anxiety, as the International Atomic Energy Agency noted in 2014.

Internationally, DU exists in a legal gray area. It is not explicitly banned by UN conventions like those that restrict land mines or chemical weapons. And although the United States applies restrictions on the weapon’s handling domestically, it does not regulate its use overseas in civilian areas with nearly the same caution.

“I think this is an area of international humanitarian law that needs a lot more attention,” says Cymie Payne, a legal scholar and professor of ecology at Rutgers University who has researched DU. “As we’ve been focusing more in recent years on the post-conflict period and thinking about peace building… we need a clean environment so people can use the environment.”

Major Jacques, the CENTCOM spokesman, says the ammunition was fired that November because of a “higher probability of destruction for targets.” Shortly after both attacks, the US-led Coalition released the videos showing multiple vehicles lit up by bombs, missiles, and prolonged fire from the 30 mm cannons of Air Force A-10s — but did not specify that the flight crews had loaded those cannons with DU. Those videos — along with dozens of other strike recordings — have been removed from official Coalition channels in recent months.

When DU rounds are loaded in A-10s, they are combined with a lesser amount of non-DU high-explosive incendiary (HEI) rounds, amounting to a “combat mix.” In November 2015, a total of 6,320 rounds of the mix were used in Syria: According to CENTCOM, 1,790 30 mm rounds — including 1,490 with DU — were fired on November 16; on November 22, 4,530 rounds of combat mix were fired containing 3,775 DU armor-piercing munitions. Though DU rounds have been fired in other theaters — including the Balkans — much of the attention centers on Iraq, where an estimated 1 million rounds were shot during the first Gulf War and the 2003 invasion.

A recent analysis of previously undisclosed firing data from the 2003 US invasion of Iraq showed that most DU rounds were fired at so-called soft targets, such as vehicles or troop positions, instead of targeting the tanks and armoured vehicles according to Pentagon guidelines that date back at least to a 1975 review by the US Air Force. The Pentagon’s current Law of War Manual states, “Depleted uranium (DU) is used in some munitions because its density and physical properties create a particularly effective penetrating combination to defeat enemy armored vehicles, including tanks.”

A line of tanker trucks in the Syrian desert on November 22nd, 2015. Image taken from CJTF video release of Coalition attacks on that day.

‘At risk of exposure’

The oil trucks hit in November 2015 were also unarmoured and would qualify as soft targets, the researchers who performed the analysis of the 2003 targeting cache contend. The trucks, in fact, were most likely manned by civilians rather than Islamic State members, according to US officials. A Pentagon representative said the United States had dropped leaflets warning of an imminent attack before the November 16th strike, in an effort to minimize casualties.

“The use of DU ammunition against oil tankers seems difficult to justify militarily on the basis of the arguments used by the US to support its use — that it is for destroying armoured targets,” says Doug Weir, head of the International Coalition to Ban Uranium Weapons. “Tankers are clearly not armoured, and the alternative non-DU HEI [high-explosive incendiary] rounds would likely have been sufficient for the task.”

The spent ammunition littering eastern Syria after the attack, along with the wreckage of the trucks, was almost surely not handled appropriately by the occupying authority — that is, the Islamic State. Even if civilians driving the trucks were not initially exposed to the toxic remnants of DU, scavengers and other local residents will likely be placed at risk for years to come.

“What will happen with the destroyed vehicles? Usually they end up in scrapyards, are stripped of valuable parts and components, and dumped,” says Wim Zwijnenburg, senior researcher at the Dutch research NGO Pax. “This puts scrap-metal workers, most likely local civilians, at risk of exposure.”

If there are few ideas for what post-Islamic State governance will resemble in eastern Syria, there are none at all about how to safely handle the depleted uranium that the US-led Coalition has placed into the environment.

Published in conjunction with Foreign Policy

For first time, Coalition now killing more civilians than Russia

Published

February 10, 2017

Written by

Samuel Oakford

Web link

New Airwars research shows that for the first time since Moscow intervened in Syria’s civil war in September 2015, airstrikes by the US-led Coalition are now claiming the lives of more civilians than Russia’s brutal aerial campaign

To date, Airwars researchers have identified 95 separate reported civilian casualty events in January across Iraq and Syria allegedly involving the Coalition. For the same period, 57 alleged Russian incidents took place.

Likely civilian deaths as a result of Coalition actions are also higher for January. Airwars presently estimates that at least 254 non-combatants were likely killed in 47 strikes evaluated as “fair” – where there are multiple local reports of civilian casualties, and confirmed Coalition airstrikes in the near vicinity on the same date. January’s civilian toll is by far the highest to have been assessed by Airwars in more than two and a half years of Coalition airstrikes.

Monitoring groups have put non-combatant deaths in Syria from Russian strikes in January far lower. The Syrian Network for Human Rights, for instance, has reported that 48 civilians were killed by Moscow’s actions – against a minimum of 91 civilians killed by Coalition strikes in Syria for the same month – a figure somewhat higher than Airwars’ own estimated minimum of 65 civilians killed in Syria only by the Coalition.

The Syrian Observatory for Human Rights puts the figure for January for those killed by both Syrian government and Russian raids and shelling at 180.

One year ago, in January 2016, Russia killed at least 713 civilians according to Airwars estimates. That was 14 times more deaths than were attributed to the Coalition for the same month. But now roles may be shifting.

For full data and interactive charts, visit https://airwars.org/data/

An inflection point for Russia and the US

Russian and Coalition casualty figures for the first month of 2017 appear to represent an inflection point in the two campaigns, which together have likely left thousands of civilians dead.

Well into December 2016, Russia was still targeting civilian-populated areas of eastern Aleppo with bombs and missiles, as regime forces retook the city’s last rebel-held neighbourhoods. A ceasefire deal was reached with the involvement of diplomats from Iran, Turkey and Russia followed shortly after. And the pace of Moscow’s airstrikes – along with their threat to civilians – has since slowed.

In parallel, the Coalition has ramped up its own operations – with civilians now at more risk. In Mosul, heavy Coalition air and artillery strikes in support of Iraqi Security Forces (ISF) have targeted fighters of so-called Islamic State (ISIL) for more than three months. And in Syria – barely reported by international media – the Coalition has been backing an aggressive ground campaign by Kurdish proxies to encircle ISIL’s self-declared capital of Raqqa.

“The regime’s Russian-backed military gains of the last year, of which the seizure of Aleppo and Russia’s subsequent rapprochement with Turkey have been key, mean that the breadth and intensity of combat has been significantly diminished,” Julien Barnes-Dacey, a senior fellow at the European Council on Foreign Relations told Airwars, referring to the level of fighting and bombings in Syria.

“The Russian-led shift,” added Barnes-Dacey, “comes just as the fight for Mosul and towards Raqqa has picked up new intensity, resulting in increased casualty numbers – a trend that could accelerate further if President Trump relaxes the rules of US engagement as some are anticipating.”

New US President Donald Trump has given Pentagon commanders 30 days to come up with a more aggressive plan to defeat ISIL. According to reports this may include further relaxing restrictions aimed at limiting harm to civilians on the battlefield.

Yet as Airwars reported on January 20th, the civilian toll from US airstrikes was already escalating steeply in the final months of the Obama administration. From the start of operations to capture Mosul on October 17th through Obama’s last day in office on January 20th, Airwars researchers assessed that at least 294 civilians were likely killed in that city alone. Unlike the siege of rebel-held areas in Aleppo, these strikes – if not the ground fighting itself – have received relatively little media coverage. In Raqqa governorate, 62 civilians were judged as likely killed in the same period.

For full data and interactive charts, visit https://airwars.org/data/

These trends have continued into Trump’s presidency. On his second day, as many as 15 civilians, including women and children, were reportedly killed in strikes on the Al-Rashidiyah neighborhood of Mosul. Local residents blamed the attack on the Coalition, which they say targeted a car bomb but which also destroyed a civilian house.

Airwars was able to reach a family member inside Mosul whose relatives were killed in the strike. “The house was targeted by Coalition airstrikes at 12:22PM on Saturday [January 20th],” the relative says. “Four family members were killed as well as seven others who had come to the house as guests. The guests were employees of a medicine factory in the same area.”

The source named his four relatives as Zahra Ibarehem Ali Jumah; Jasim Mohammed Hassan Ali; Shamsah Jasim Hassan Ali; and Rania Raed Maohammed Hassan. Four members of a second family also killed in the event have also been named by others.

Airwars has also been provided with a picture from the scene that appears to depict the remnants of an American-manufactured ammunition in the rubble. Two weapons experts, including Human Rights Watch’s senior arms researcher Mark Hiznay indentified the remnants as belonging to an American-produced Hellfire air-to-surface missile. The US, UK and Iraqi militaries all possess Hellfires.

Remnant of Hellfire missile fired in Mosul on January 21st. (Image courtesy of Fathil Jasim)

“January was the deadliest month yet for civilians in Mosul,” says Airwars’ Iraq researcher. “More than 50 airstrikes reportedly targeted them, killing in their homes women, children, professors, engineers and physicians.” In total, at least 133 strikes took place in Mosul during January, according to daily Coalition strike reports.

Shamsah Jasim Hassan Ali, one of those killed in the January 21st strike. (Image courtesy of Fatihil Jasim).

“It is true that the left (eastern) side of Mosul has been liberated, but civilians paid a very high price,” he added.

Raqqa in crisis

Meanwhile, having reportedly discarded plans drawn up by the Obama administration to take Raqqa from ISIL with the assistance of Syrian-Kurdish forces, it remains unclear what President Trump’s plan are in Syria. For the last several months, the Coalition has launched numerous daily strikes – up to 22 in a 24-hour period – in the vicinity of the city, primarily in surrounding towns and villages that are held by ISIL.

During January, Coalition forces launched at least 336 strikes “near” Raqqa – a massive tally – according to daily strike reports. Without a clear strategy to take the city with ground forces, airstrikes are likely to endure for an extended period of time, and continue to claim the lives of civilians – potentially without matching gains in territory.

Syrian monitoring groups reported large death tolls in Raqqa from Coalition strikes just days into the New Year. On January 6th, airstrikes northeast of Tabaqa were said to have killed at least eight civilians. Other strikes in the area have claimed dozens of lives. Those trends have continued during the opening weeks of the Trump administration. On January 27th, four civilians including up to three children were reportedly killed in Shanina village in Raqqa governorate. On January 30th, al Tabaqa was hit again, killing up to three civilians – this time reportedly by a raid which struck a school. Local sources said one of the casualties was a person with special needs.

Fadel Abdul Ghany, director of the Syrian Network for Human Rights, said the contrast with Russian strikes – which for months targeted medical facilities and other protected sites in clear violation of international law – was changing.

While Russia continues to bomb opposition controlled areas, elsewhere “the level of strikes has dropped and in some areas stopped completely, which has had a very positive impact on the lives of people living in those areas,” said Ghany. “We are starting to see an increase in the movement of civilians between villages and cities, in markets and various workshops. Children are back playing out in the street and out in the farms.”

The point, he said, was not that Russia had discovered human rights norms, but that the Coalition risked alienating more Syrians as its bombing campaign against ISIL heads towards its third anniversary.

“The big and fundamental difference is that international coalition countries are leading countries in the defense of human rights,” he added. “Unfortunately, this huge number of victims [caused by the Coalition] hasn’t led these countries to change their combat strategy.”

▲ Man stands in front of destroyed homes in Mosul on January 12th. (Image courtesy of Iraqyoon)

Trump’s ‘Muslim Ban’ order could undermine battle for Mosul

Published

January 31, 2017

Written by

Samuel Oakford

Web link

The Executive Order signed by President Donald J. Trump on January 27th has sent shock waves through refugee communities, citizens of the seven Muslim-majority countries banned from travel to the US, and the wider international community. But one inclusion appears to have taken even the Pentagon and military planners by surprise.

Key US ally Iraq – in the midst of a bloody campaign to capture Mosul from so called Islamic State (ISIL) – finds itself on the list of banned nations, placing in limbo the visas of many Iraqis who have helped the US. Also at risk: extensive cooperation between thousands of American soldiers and their Iraqi counterparts, painstakingly built up since August 2014.

In an angry response to the Trump ban, Iraqi MPs on January 30th supported a “reciprocity measure” that would similarly prevent Americans from entering the country. Though the measure is so far non-binding, it illustrates how quickly relations have been souring in the days following Trump’s action. In a report from the front lines in Mosul, a member of Iraqi special forces told Associated Press: “When he [Trump] made this decision he destroyed us.”

Perhaps in response to such tensions, in recent days the Coalition has been heavily stressing the vital and deadly role being played by Iraqi forces in the war against ISIL. Daily strike releases now note that Iraqi Security Forces (ISF) “are willing to take the brunt of fighting to liberate their country.” Some Iraqi officials estimate that in addition to 5,000 civilian casualties, some 1,600 Iraqi troops have already been killed or injured in the ongoing battle for Mosul.

‘The Coalition was not consulted’

Trump’s controversial executive order has frozen the US’s refugee program for 120 days – and also blocks all citizens from Iraq, Syria, Yemen, Libya, Somalia, Sudan and Iran from entering the United States for at least 90 days. Widely criticized as a ‘Muslim Ban’ – in part due to language of the text, and claims by Trump that the US would privilege some religious minorities – the order has led to major protests across the United States including at airports, where over 100 people had reportedly been detained. The first well-publicized incident, at New York’s JFK Airport, saw the detention of an Iraqi man, Hameed Darweesh, who had previously worked as a translator for the US military.

The signing of the controversial order took place at the Pentagon, following the ceremonial swearing-in of former US Marine Corps general James Mattis as US Defense Secretary. Mattis, who stood next to Trump as he signed the order, is seen by some critics of the president as a voice of reason within his Cabinet.

It has since been reported that the Pentagon may not have had a chance to provide input ahead of the signing. According to the New York Times Mattis “did not see a final version of the order until Friday morning, only hours before Mr. Trump arrived to sign it at the Pentagon.”

Airwars reached out to the Pentagon to confirm whether Department of Defense officials had been able to offer advice on the order. The Pentagon referred the question to the White House, which did not respond.

The US-led Coalition did however respond. Chief spokesman Colonel John Dorrian said on January 30th that “The Coalition was not consulted, to my knowledge.”

US forces have invested heavily in rebuilding the Iraqi military since 2014. Trust between the two allies remains vital in the fight against ISIL, both on and off the battlefield (US Army/ Spc. Christopher Brecht)

Mosul Campaign

Iraqi forces are presently in the middle of the biggest military assault since World War 2, as they seek to recapture the country’s second largest city from ISIL forces. On January 25th – two days before Trump’s executive order was signed – US Army Maj. Gen. Joseph M. Martin declared that the eastern half of Mosul had been completely taken after 100 days of fighting.

“It’s the hardest door-to-door fighting the world has seen in recent history,” Martin told reporters. “There is still a difficult fight ahead in western Mosul, but the ISF has proven that they are both a professional and formidable fighting force.”

There are at least 5,000 American soldiers on the ground in Iraq, in addition to civilian contractors. The US provides direct support through Coalition airstrikes, Apache helicopter firepower and artillery. On the ground, US forces have also been advising their Iraqi partners on the front lines. As Airwars recently reported, by mid January the Coalition had already launched 419 airstrikes in support of Iraqi forces at Mosul – while also firing more than 4,500 artillery shells and rockets. All of these actions require close coordination between the Coalition and Iraqi forces.

The US-backed campaign to rid Iraq of ISIL has in turn displaced hundreds of thousands of civilians, and laid entire cities and towns to waste. At the outset of the Mosul assault, some 1.2 million Iraqis remained trapped in the city. Today, the UN estimates that the majority – some 750,000 – are still within occupied eastern Mosul, which Iraqi forces have yet to penetrate.

That the US would now cut off access to refugees from a country it invaded 14 years ago is a particularly bitter irony for many Iraqis. Baghdad’s former ambassador to the United States Lukman Faily – himself now banned – is one of many high ranking officials voicing their anger: “To be treated like this… to say it’s a betrayal (is) an understatement,” he told Yahoo News.

Members of President Trump’s own party have also pointed to potential blowback from the executive order – which could put civilian lives in even greater danger. “At this very moment, American troops are fighting side-by-side with our Iraqi partners to defeat ISIL. But this executive order bans Iraqi pilots from coming to military bases in Arizona to fight our common enemies,” said Senators John McCain and Lindsey Graham in a joint statement.

“Our most important allies in the fight against ISIL are the vast majority of Muslims who reject its apocalyptic ideology of hatred. This executive order sends a signal, intended or not, that America does not want Muslims coming into our country. That is why we fear this executive order may do more to help terrorist recruitment than improve our security.”

In New York, Hameed Khalif Darweesh, the Iraqi whose detention helped lead to a first wave of US street protests, was eventually released. He remains positive. “America is the land of freedom, the land of life,” he told reporters. “America is the greatest nation.”

Pentagon officials may struggle to placate others still working with the US military. On January 30th, a spokesperson said the DoD was now working on a list of Iraqis who had assisted US troops, and who might be exempted from Trump’s order – evidently something that hadn’t been done before the new president put pen to paper.

▲ U.S. Navy corpsmen assigned to Team 40, Task Force Al-Taqaddum and Iraqi security forces soldiers celebrate following a graduation ceremony near Camp Manion, Iraq, Jan 11, 2017. ISF soldiers graduated from a three-day combat lifesaver course taught by Navy corpsmen in support of Combined Joint Task Force – Operation Inherent Resolve, the global Coalition to defeat ISIL in Iraq and Syria. (U.S. Army photo by Spc. Christopher Brecht)

Missing in action: Hundreds of civilian deaths pass unremarked in Obama’s final days

Published

January 20, 2017

Written by

Samuel Oakford

Web link

In the last weeks of the Obama presidency, the US-led air war against so-called Islamic State intensified dramatically – leading to hundreds of likely civilian deaths. Yet in contrast to recent events at Aleppo, international press coverage has been largely absent.

Since the official start of operations to capture Mosul on October 17th, Airwars researchers have tracked 91 allegations of civilian casualties from Coalition airstrikes in and around the city. Of those, 35 claimed events are from just the first 17 days of 2017, as Iraqi forces sought to capture all of eastern Mosul.

So far four Coalition incidents in the battle for Iraq’s second city have been confirmed, taking the lives of at least 20 civilians. A further 35 incidents have been graded as “fair” by Airwars researchers – meaning there are two or more credible local reports and Coalition airstrikes reported in the near vicinity. Based on Airwars assessments, those additional alleged strikes likely claimed the lives of between 294 and 350 civilians in Mosul.

In the same period – from October 17th onward – Airwars researchers have recorded 62 alleged civilian casualty incidents stemming from Coalition operations supporting US proxy ground forces in Raqqa governorate. Two of those incidents have been confirmed by the Coalition, while a further 43 were rated “fair” by Airwars researchers. Based on Airwars monitoring, those incidents appear likely to have claimed the lives of another 154 to 229 civilians.

Reports from Mosul in January have seen daily allegations of civilian deaths. Airwars has learned of at least one incident – which reportedly claimed the lives of 11 civilians from one family – a full month after it occurred. It is likely that additional cases will be uncovered as journalists gain access to the liberated east of the city. And in Raqqa, several alleged Coalition strikes over the last month have claimed dozens of lives.

Both cities are being hit heavily by foreign airpower, leaving many civilians dead amid siege-like conditions. But in the waning days of the Obama administration – and just after the much-covered fall of rebel-held Aleppo – media interest shifted. In total, 450 or more civilians appear to have been killed in intense Coalition actions across Iraq and Syria since October – yet their deaths have largely been ignored.

“With reported fatalities from Coalition strikes at record levels we would have expected significant media engagement,” says Airwars Director Chris Woods. “Instead, anything beyond local reporting has been almost non-existent.”

Erbil, Iraq: US troops prepare AH-64E Apache attack helicopters for operations on January 10 2017 (Photo via US Army video.)

Heavy firepower

According to the United Nations, the assault on Mosul is the largest such military operation since World War Two. Despite an estimated 1.2 million civilians being trapped in the city at the start of the siege, the firepower unleashed has been formidable.

According to military officials, the Coalition has already released more than 9,500 munitions during 419 airstrikes in support of operations to capture Mosul. According to a spokesperson, those strikes have “destroyed 145 VBIEDs, [vehicle borne improvised explosive devices] 349 buildings/facilities, 845 craters/bridges, 132 tunnels, 335 vehicles, 377 bunkers, 23 AAA [anti-aircraft artillery], and 300 artillery/mortar systems.”

American Apache helicopters are also used regularly by the Coalition, and have fired more than 150 munitions according to officials. Airwars can also report that as of January 12th, more than 4,500 artillery shells and rockets had been fired by Coalition ground forces in the vicinity of Mosul since October 17th.

None of these totals count heavy weapons used by Iraqi Security Forces, or missiles and bombs dropped by the Iraqi Air Force. Though the UN recently claimed Iraqi forces have avoided artillery strikes inside Mosul in order to avoid civilian casualties, monitoring of social media accounts used by Iraqi forces show artillery and other ground-based munitions regularly being fired into the city. Iraq’s own air force of F-16s, armed Chinese drones and attack helicopters is also heavily engaged, and has reportedly been responsible for civilian deaths.

https://twitter.com/Danger6_1ID/status/821959771750367233

Coalition commander Major General Martin tweets in support of Iraqi forces using rockets and artillery in the assault on Mosul, January 19th 2017

Counting the dead

Public estimates vary of civilians killed since the start of operations on October 17th to capture Mosul. The United Nations, which was recently pressured into no longer publishing tallies of Iraqi security forces killed in the battle, does not have an official estimate of civilian deaths – though one UN official has suggested it could be nearly half of all combat fatalities in Mosul. In a “normal conflict this would be around 15 to 20 percent,” another UN source told Airwars. “Here it is surely higher.”

For the first two months of the Mosul campaign, signs pointed to ISIL being responsible for the majority of civilian deaths. The militant group indiscriminately mortared captured neighbourhoods, and fired on non-combatants attempting to escape ISIL territory – claiming the lives of many civilians.

But there are also ominous signs, especially of late, that civilians are dying in increasing numbers as a result of intensified ground operations supported by Coalition air power. It is not always clear who is responsible for civilian deaths, but casualty numbers are moving upwards.

On January 12th for example, as many as 30 civilians were reportedly killed on the left (Western) side of the Tigris River, which has yet to see ground assaults by Iraqi security forces. According to The Guardian, witnesses described at least three missiles striking the al-Jadida district. The target may have been a senior ISIL leader named Harbi Abdel Qader. “He was not in the building at the time, but several members of his family died,” wrote the paper, citing a local resident. It was unclear whether the strike had been carried out by the Coalition or the Iraqi Air Force.

Airwars spoke to one Western journalist who has been covering operations in Mosul since October. He described significant early access to the battle, then far less as the fighting pushed into the city. Today, he is able to venture once more into liberated areas. But reporting has not kept pace with the civilian toll.

“By early December our access was basically completely cut off,” he said. “There hasn’t been a lot of reporting [on civilian casualties] in Mosul. I don’t think there is enough – the amount of reporting doesn’t reflect the reality.”

Airwars’ Iraq researcher has closely monitored civilian casualty claims in Mosul for the past two years. He says the firepower reportedly unleashed by Iraqi forces and the Coalition has increased since the end of December, as they pressed towards the Tigris from the east – capturing important districts and landmarks like the city’s University.

In many cases, ISIL fighters may be present in an area, darting in and out of buildings or firing sniper rounds from a roof. But they may also have gone by the time strikes are called in.

“According to locals, twenty minutes later American jets come and destroy those locations even if there is no ISIS,” says the researcher.

A family slain

Salam al Sultan, a Moslawi who now lives in Canada, told Airwars how eleven members of his family were killed in the early afternoon of December 13th by one such incident in east Mosul – after airstrikes tried to take out an ISIL sniper a few houses down. Their bodies could only be recovered from the rubble a month later.

Salam’s uncle, Ahmed Nather Mahmood, lived with his wife and two sons, Sehab and Amear and their families in al Sukur, a Mosul neighbourhood which has recently seen heavy fighting.

Sometime around 1pm, a neighbour who had planned to flee the fighting arrived to see if the Mahmood family would leave with him. Fearful of the violence around them, Salam’s family had already packed to escape, but told the neighbour to linger just a bit longer.

“He came to them and said let us leave. They said let us finish our lunch, and we will leave together,” said Salam, speaking to Airwars by phone from Canada. “The neighbour said no I’m leaving.”

Minutes later, an airstrike obliterated the home. Salam, who had already lost one brother to an ISIS execution in 2015 and another to unknown assailants during violence in Mosul in 2008, now lost eleven more members of his family.

“They were going to leave… Hanan said ‘even my luggage was ready, my bag was ready,’” he said, referring to a female cousin who survived the attack, but whose whereabouts are now unclear. “They were just going to finish their lunch.”

For a month the bodies of Salam’s uncle, aunt, his brothers and their dead children lay under the shattered remnants of their home. Only on January 14th were other family members and neighbours able to start retrieving their corpses. The stench was overpowering.

Salam says his family was fearful of airstrikes, but considered them “more accurate” prior to the operation to retake the city, and especially of late. The Iraqi government, he said, was behind schedule – and now moved quickly with “massive firepower.”

Only after the attack did those who survived learn why the area may have been targeted: an ISIS sniper had apparently been spotted on a roof two houses down.“If there is a sniper how come they don’t use a small machine gun from a plane, how come they have to use a big rocket to destroy three or four houses?”

The house of Ahmed Nather Mahmood, where eleven family members died. Photograph courtesy of family.

‘Fear has me paralyzed’

In November Airwars spoke with Noora, a Moslawi now living in the United Kingdom. She described then how her young cousin and the girl’s mother were killed in airstrikes on Mosul during 2015. A year later, another relative was cut down by an airdropped munition.

Noora’s grandparents and aunt have remained in Mosul, communicating intermittently as they waited for security forces to reach their neighbourhood. In the summer of 2016, her grandmother had referred offhand to an airstrike as “nothing.” After reviewing the incident with Airwars, Noora learned that the attack likely left nearly a dozen civilians dead, and was extremely close to where her grandmother lived. It was certainly not “nothing.”

On January 10th 2017, Airwars spoke to Noora again. “They’re getting close to my family’s neighbourhood,” she wrote. “Fear has me paralyzed.” Days earlier, on January 6th, her aunt had been near to a deadly strike that killed several members of a family with which hers was close. Local reports indicated that some 20 civilians were killed when alleged Coalition planes bombed near the entrance of a mosque in the Ziraei district of eastern Mosul. Those local reports and social media posts included the names of Noora’s family’s friends.

During the bombing Noora’s aunt called her family, distraught. “There were so many strikes that day,” she said. Footage posted by an ISIL-linked outlet showed the destruction. An internal UN human rights assessment obtained by Airwars included the following account of the incident:

Airstrike reportedly kills 17 civilians and wounds 11 others in Mosul: During the morning of 6 January, sources alleged that airstrikes targeting an ISIL gathering in Ziraie neighbourhood of central Mosul killed 17 civilians, including seven women and four children, and wounded 11 others, including four women and two children.

On January 18th, Iraq’s government said it had gained complete control of eastern Mosul. Some 450,000 residents are now free of ISIL. But nearly double that number – around 750,000 people – remain to the west of the Tigris River according to UN figures. Already behind its stated schedule to retake the entire city, Iraqi armed forces will now turn their attention to the left bank. Numerous additional civilian casualties are likely.

Raqqa: the invisible campaign

While the assault on Mosul has been reasonably well reported, almost no international media coverage has been given to Coalition-supported actions to recapture Raqqa city from so-called islamic State.

In some of his final comments, outgoing US Defense Secretary Ash Carter noted that “our local partners continue to converge down on Raqqa and I’m also confident that they will soon have ISIL’s so-called capital isolated.” Yet Airwars tracking suggests the cost to civilians has been high – with at least 154 non-combatants recently alleged killed around the city.

The US’s preferred ground proxies the Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF) – comprising mostly Kurdish irregulars – have captured a string of villages and towns in heavy fighting in recent weeks, supported by intense Coalition (mainly US) airstrikes. But the reported civilian death toll has been very high, with almost daily allegations of ‘massacres’ from key local monitors.

“In November we saw almost daily allegations and sometimes several a day – so that in that one month alone there were 35 incidents with more than 150 civilians claimed killed,” says Airwars’ senior Syria researcher Kinda Haddad. “This pattern continued into December – albeit somewhat reduced – with 14 alleged incidents causing over 90 civilian casualties.”

“This has been a consistent pattern we have seen over the course of the war,” adds Haddad. “Every time strikes are stepped up we see a notable rise in allegations of civilian casualties. As ever, this is because ISIL is based in civilian centres and not on an imaginary front line. They live among civilians and their offices are located on main streets and in residential and office buildings. So while individually they may be legitimate military targets, their location means they are in effect also civilian targets.”

Widah Abdallah, a victim of a Nov 19th attack on Bia’as village. Te Coalition says the incident is now under investigation (via Raqqa is Being Slaughtered Silently)

Among the incidents tracked by Haddad and her colleagues was a series of attacks on Al Heisha village in Raqqa governorate on November 8th, which reportedly left as many as 24 civilians dead. In that case, both the Coalition and the SDF – were blamed. In daily reporting for November 7th-8th and November 8th-9th, the Coalition reported two strikes near “Ar Raqqah.”

On the same day – November 8th – between two and five civilians, possibly including two children, were reportedly killed in Al Kalta village.

On November 19th, between 8 and 11 civilians were killed in Bia’as village in an incident that the Coalition has confirmed to Airwars is now under investigation. Width Abdullah (pictured) was among the dead. A similar pattern of heavy casualties from reported airstrikes continued into the next month.

Fadel Abdul Ghani, director of the Syrian Network for Human Rights, points to an incident on December 9th, at a time when SDF forces were able to reach Ja’bar Castle near the city of al Tabaqa. “International forces launched raids to support the progress of the Syrian Democratic Forces and caused dozens of civilian casualties,” Mr Abdul Ghani told Airwars. “The most prominent incident was the bombing of the village of Ma’yezila in northern Raqqa, which is under the control of Daesh – killing 22 civilians, including six children and six women.”

Asked why he thought there was such a lack of international media coverage of the toll inflicted by the anti-ISIL campaign at Raqqa, Mr Abdul Ghani said: “The justification is always there – Daesh.”

The girl Reham Al Haj Saleh, age 13, died in #IntlCoalition warplanes missiles fired on Al Tabaqa city in #Raqqa, Dec 20#Syria pic.twitter.com/VBQQdrzoRk

— Syrian Network (@snhr) December 21, 2016

In 2017, heavy Coalition strikes have continued. On January 6th, another raid northeast of Tabaqa reportedly claimed the lives of at least eight civilians. The Syrian Observatory for Human rights reported that “the death toll is expected to rise because there are some people in a critical situation.”

“The Al-Swidiyyeh massacre is considered the first massacre against civilians carried out by warplanes of the coalition during the year 2017,” said the Observatory.

Donald Trump, inaugurated as US President on January 20th, has promised to “bomb the hell out of ISIS” – making defeat of the terror group a key goal. If the Trump campaign is to match or increase the intensity of the last months of the Obama administration, the civilian toll will only grow.

Turkey: rogue Coalition member

Published

January 18, 2017

Written by

Samuel Oakford

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Among the dozen nations that are officially a part of the kinetic US-led Coalition fighting ISIL in Iraq and Syria, few are more important – and none potentially more challenging for the Coalition itself – than Turkey.

A NATO member, Turkey shares a border with both Iraq and Syria, and has deployed troops in each. Yet in neither case are the Turkish soldiers there part of Inherent Resolve operations. The Coalition depends heavily for its Syria actions on Incirlik air base in southern Turkey. Yet in recent weeks, Turkey has gone so far as to call in Russian airstrikes during its fight for the key ISIL-occupied Syrian city of Al-Bab – a startling development that Ankara blames on Washington’s refusal to help.

As Airwars observed in its December 2016 audit of the anti-ISIL alliance, “Turkey remains the most ambivalent member of the US-led Coalition – with almost all of its military actions viewed as unilateral by its purported allies.” While Turkey has launched numerous air raids into both Iraq and Syria, Airwars researchers at the time observed that no more than ten had actually been in direct support of Coalition objectives.

Disparate enemies

Underlying all of Turkey’s cross-border actions is a tension between two disparate enemies. Ankara is determined to suppress a domestic Kurdish insurgency, while also reining back ascendant Kurdish forces in both Syria and Iraq. At the same time, Turkey is now directly confronting the so-called Islamic State in the Levant. When Turkey launched an invasion of northern Syria in August 2016, its troops pushed ISIL from a buffer zone along the border. But Turkey also targeted local Kurdish People’s Protection Units (YPG), fresh from their own Coalition-backed victories against the Islamic State.

A female Kurdish soldier sits atop an armored vehicle, allegedly captured from Turkish-backed rebels in rural Aleppo. (Girê Sipî Post, posted October 13, 2016)

The Ankara government considers the YPG to be the Syrian arm of the Kurdistan Workers’ Party (PKK), which has waged an insurgency inside Turkey since the 1980s – often employing terror tactics. In 2013 the Turkish government reached a ceasefire with the rebels – though that deal eroded as the Syrian war progressed. Ankara had to watch as Kurdish irregulars gained prominence and territory in northern Syria, which some said might form part of a future Kurdish state. In 2015 the ceasefire completely collapsed.

In addition to fighting the PKK – along with conducting alleged human rights violations in Kurdish areas of Turkey – the Turkish government has bombed PKK sites in Iraqi Kurdistan (the Kurdish regional government there is not itself allied to the PKK). Complicating matters further, Ankara has insinuated itself into the fight to retake Mosul, basing its troops out of an old military camp near the city since 2015. At least 800 Turkish troops remain at Bashiqa, against the wishes of the government in Baghdad.

Harking back to the Ottoman period when that area of northern Iraq was part of the former empire, Turkey’s President Erdogan insists that it is still a part of his own nation’s zone of influence. Turkish forces have shelled Mosul, reportedly killing civilians, while the US-led Coalition has suggested its presence is not sanctioned. “It is the position of the US and the coalition that anyone that is fighting terrorism in Iraq should be doing so in coordination with the government of Iraq,” Coalition spokesperson Colonel John Dorrian told Airwars in November.

The Turkish line – that “Iraqi sovereignty is very important to us” but that its own (unwelcome) military presence is “a result of need” as Prime Minister Binali Yildirim said in January 2017 – is contradictory. Yet it is a line the Turks have stood by, as they seek to assert themselves ahead of ISIL’s expected fall in northern Iraq. The Turkish government wants to check Iranian-backed militias in the area, and, it claims, to protect local Turkmen communities with whom leaders in Ankara say they enjoy a kinship and ancestral bonds. From its occupied base at Bashiqa, Turkey has also trained both friendly Kurdish Peshmerga troops, and elements of local Sunni tribal militias who are opposed to ISIL.

“You called us to Bashiqa, and now you are telling us to leave. Excuse me, but I have kin there, I have Turkmen brothers there, Turkish brothers who ask us to come and help,” Erdogan said in October 2016. “Excuse me, but I won’t leave.”

Bogged down at Al-Bab

Advancing swiftly through northern Syria in the early days of its 2016 invasion,Turkey and its local Arab allies in Operation Euphrates Shield now risk becoming bogged down in a bitter struggle for Al-Bab – a key city where ISIL appears willing to fight to the death. In the wake of heavy troop losses over the past month, Turkey has loudly protested a lack of Coalition air support for its operation to capture the city – an assertion backed by the Coalition’s own strike reports, which show no raids in the vicinity.

The US prefers that the Coalition keeps its Syria focus on ISIL’s self-declared capital of Raqqa, where dozens of strikes have taken place in recent weeks. The Coalition has also poured intense firepower into Mosul, stretching resources between the two fronts. There has also been irritation as the Turks push hard against Washington’s favoured (and mostly Kurdish) SDF allies. Turkey’s defense minister in turn has threatened to cut off US access to Incirlik airbase.

https://twitter.com/worldonalert/status/812766547903217664

Dozens of Turkish troops have been reported killed in the bloody fight for Al-Bab

“US-Turkish relations are not good; the US primarily is trying to prevent the Syrian Kurds and Turkish troops and the Turkish-allied rebels from fighting each other, rather than the Islamic State,” says Aaron Stein, a resident senior fellow at the Atlantic Council’s Rafik Hariri Center for the Middle East. “Turkish strikes in Syria and Iraq,” he notes, “are not coordinated with the Coalition beforehand.”

As the Al-Bab campaign continued, Turkey reached a ceasefire deal along with Iran and Russia in late December involving the Syrian government and certain rebel groups. Sensing an opening, Russia began cooperating with Turkey at Al-Bab. The tentative set-up came just a year after Turkey shot down a Russian jet along the Syrian border – and just days after the assassination of Russia’s ambassador in Ankara.

Turkish defense officials have confirmed an arrangement with Russia. One military source told the Turkish daily Hurriyet that “We have got the cooperation that we couldn’t get with the [U.S.-led anti-ISIL] coalition with Russia.”

Though remarkable for a member of NATO – particularly one so at odds with Moscow since the start of the Syrian war – the recent deal with Russia could still be viewed as being in line with Turkish self-interest: defeating ISIL, while also preventing a de facto Kurdish state from emerging on the fringes of Syria, Iraq and Turkey.

A US F-16 takes off from Incirlilk airbase in eastern Turkey. Ankara has threatened to throw the Coalition out if it continues to support Kurdish ‘terrorist’ forces in Syria.

Failed coup

Much has also changed since the failed and bloody coup attempt which sought to overthrow President Erdogan in mid 2016. Since then, Turkish nationalism has been on the rise – and old certainties are under pressure.

“Turkey is officially part of the Coalition, but really since the botched coup attempt of last July, and then the normalization with Russia, there has been so much anti-Americanism that’s been widespread in Turkey,” says Sinan Ulgen, visiting scholar at Carnegie Endowment for International Peace.

“There is hope in Ankara that things will improve – and they can’t be much worse than today with the Obama administration. Not only that [the administration] failed in Syria. but there is widespread belief that the US had consciously moved to undermine Turkey’s position both domestically and in Syria by aligning itself with the Kurds, by arming the [YPG], and by extension the PKK.”

Ulgen estimates that Turkey could take Al-Bab within the next two months. The question then, is what comes next? “If Turkey successfully captures Al-Bab, will that be the end of the Turkish offensive in Syria? Or, as some claim, will Turkish forces then be directed to Manbij?”

Manbij, to the west of the Euphrates, was captured by the Kurds after a bloody, Coalition-backed fight in 2016. The town is now controlled by the SDF, and a Turkish assault may represent a point of no return for the US, which has thus far withstood the dissonance of nominally allying with the Turks and relying on their air bases, while actively and deeply supporting the YPG in Syria – the very force that the Coalition plans to support in taking ISIL’s proclaimed capital of Raqqa.

Major Michael Meyer, a spokesperson for US CENTCOM, told Airwars on January 10th that despite reports that the US was increasing support for Turkish military operations, “there have been no changes to existing US policy regarding support to the Turkish military in Al-Bab and we are not conducting US airstrikes in or near Al-Bab.”

However, a week later the Coalition confirmed on January 17th that the first strikes in support of Turkish forces had in fact taken place.There have been four of these strikes so far,” spokesman Colonel Dorrian told reporters. “And again, we do expect to continue doing these types of strikes in the days ahead.”

What if any deal the US-led Coalition has made with Turkey on air support remains unclear. Any decision of how to proceed with the Turkish government, in any event, will be handed off the President Donald Trump.

“The United States is kind of checked out – everyone is waiting for Trump, and I think that the major players like the Turks have in this sense essentially written off the Obama administration,” Steven Cook, senior fellow at the Council on Foreign Relations, told Airwars. “Putin and his people seemingly want to flip the Turks, and you have a certain amount of receptivity to that in Ankara.”

The risk of that occurring may have been furthered after CENTCOM’s official twitter account posted a statement issued by the SDF, writing underneath that “SDF confirms that it has no affiliation or ties to PKK.” Ibrahim Kalin, press secretary to President Erdogan, tweeted back, “Is this a joke or @CENTCOM has lost its senses? Do you believe anyone will buy this? The US must stop trying to legitimize a terrorist group.”

Is this a joke or @CENTCOM has lost its senses? Do you believe anyone will buy this? The US must stop trying to legitimize a terrorist group

— İbrahim Kalın (@ikalin1) January 12, 2017

Turkey’s presidential spokesman blasts CENTCOM for its support of ‘terrorists’

Civilians at risk

Any Turkish attack on Manbij would also be ominous for civilians living there. Hundreds already likely died in the US-backed campaign to oust Islamic State from the city and its environs in 2016. A fresh Turkish assault would inevitably lead to more casualties. The Syrian Observatory estimates that at least 280 civilians – including 100 women and children – have already been killed by Turkey and its allies since they invaded northern Syria five months ago.

On December 9th – to take a recent example – local reports indicated that at least 13 civilians died in an airstrike on Al-Bab. Citing an ISIL media affiliate, Al Jazeera said two families were among the dead and blamed multiple “Turkish airstrikes.” The Syrian Observatory also blamed the Turkish military, while the Syrian Network for Human Rights blamed the Coalition. While Airwars has classed the incident as “contested,” the Coalition did not report strikes in the area on that date – and it appears most likely that Turkey was to blame on this occasion.

“The picture is often not clear, and you often don’t know with strikes – you have some sources saying it’s Turkey, some saying it’s Russia, some saying it’s the Syrian regime,” says Kinda Haddad, chief Syria researcher at Airwars, who has tracked local reports on Aleppo governorate for two years. “That said, there was clearly a very obvious spike in allegations of civilian casualties from Turkish strikes in the second half of last year. As with the Russians and the Syrian government, they deny the civilian casualties.”

Yet without US air support, the current Turkish attempt to take Al-Bab and possibly Manbij could be even bloodier for non-combatants. As a recent Washington Institute study assessed, “Turkey will eventually take Al-Bab with or without U.S. help, likely by shelling the city and otherwise causing heavy civilian casualties.”

“Erdogan might then apply the same technique to Manbij if the SDF has not withdrawn by then, leaving Washington with the prospect of major civilian carnage, direct Turkish-Kurdish military confrontation, and further interference by the Russians, who would likely insert themselves as arbiters between Ankara and the Kurds,” the assessment concluded.

Airwars reached out to both the Turkish mission to the UN and its embassy in Washington for comment on this article. As of publication, neither had responded.

With the forthcoming inauguration of Donald Trump on January 20th, US policy remains very much in flux. The recent Obama approach – going after ISIL, while dodging tough decisions about whether Kurdish ground proxies or NATO ally Turkey are more important to US interests – may not sustain. The potential for new, explosive violence and needless civilian casualties in both Iraq and Syria remains a serious threat.

Analysis: Coalition-confirmed civilian deaths – December 2016 release

Published

December 16, 2016

Written by

Samuel Oakford

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The US-led Coalition on December 1st released its first monthly estimates of civilian deaths from operations in Iraq and Syria, as well as investigations into several earlier incidents – including its version of the deadliest single attack attributed to the alliance over more than than two years of bombings in Iraq and Syria.

The Coalition now takes over from CENTCOM as the lead reporter of civilian casualty events, in an effort to speed up the release of civilian casualty information. Twenty two alleged civilian events are mentioned in the first release. Eight are dismissed on the grounds that no Coalition strikes took place in the vicinity that day. A further four allegations are rejected because of insufficient evidence. And three more events remain under investigation.

The Coalition also confirmed seven new casualty events which it says left 54 civilians dead between March and October 2016. Public estimates of civilian casualtes in these same events range from 125 to 277 killed.

Overall, the release brings to 173 the number of civilians so far admitted killed by the United States. None of its twelve allies have so far admitted any civilian casualties – despite more than 3,600 airstrikes between them.

Family of eight

The most recent Coalition admission relates to an October 22nd US strike at Fasitiyah [or Fadhiliya] on the outskirts of Mosul. The raid, which came five days into the official campaign to recapture the city, killed eight members of the same family. A reporter for the Guardian, Fazel Hawramy, visited the site and obtained eyewitness testimony, before notifying the Coalition.

The Coalition’s admission of Fadhiliya – just five weeks later – is the fastest turnaround yet for any investigation. However, after more than 200 reported Coalition airstrikes in support of Iraqi forces attacking Mosul, the incident remains the only official admission of civilians killed in the campaign by the Coalition – despite hundreds of alleged deaths.

The December 1st release marked the first time that the Coalition rather than US Central Command (CENTCOM) had reported on civilian casualties. It is intended to be the start of regular monthly updates (with a delay time of one month) provided by the CJTF. Until now the US military has been the only member of the Coalition to admit to civilian casualties, which it did independently. This trend continues, with American officials confirming to Airwars that the seven incidents newly admitted to by the Coalition were in fact the result of strikes carried out by US forces.

One third of Coaltion airstrikes in Iraq are carried out by the US’s allies – which all deny civilian casualties. As Airwars noted in its recent transparency audit, while the temptation might be to assume the US is responsible for all Coalition civilian deaths in Iraq and Syria, CENTCOM’s declaration of casualties may instead “indicate a greater willingness by the United States to subject its own actions to both internal and external scrutiny.”

Bodies of eight family members are removed following a US airstrike on Fadhiliya, Iraq on October 22nd 2016 (Picture courtesy of Fazel Hawramy)

Worst incident

In its December report, the Coalition has finally conceded killing 24 civilians at al Tokhar, Syria in the worst-ever reported casualty event in 28 months of war. But its admission still leaves many questions unanswered.

According to the Coalition, a night time July 18th-19th US strike on the village al Tokhar in support of local Kurdish proxies killed 100 ISIL fighters. However, “it is assessed that up to 24 civilians who had been interspersed with combatants were inadvertently killed in a known ISIL staging area where no civilians had been seen in the 24 hours prior to the attack.”

Yet local accounts have consistently put the death toll far higher, with up to 203 civilians alleged killed. Amnesty International has estimated that at least 73 civilians died that night, while the Syrian Network has now published details of 98 non-combatants killed. Other accounts put the number of dead at around 200.

According to Amnesty, “the attacks appear to have been conducted without adequate precautions taken to safeguard civilians and may have amounted to indiscriminate or disproportionate attacks.”

In the Coalition’s own version of events, “ISIL fighters were preparing for a large counterattack against partnered Syrian Arab Coalition/Syrian Democratic Forces, and unknown to Coalition planners, civilians were moving around within the military staging area, even as other civilians in the nearby village had departed over the previous day.”

It does not deny that more than 100 people were killed in al Thokar early that morning, but claims the vast majority were ISIL fighters – contrasting heavily with all other public accounts.

Yassar, Ammar and Mahmoud – the children of Suleiman al Daher – were among at least 78 civilians reported killed in a US airstrike on al Tokhar on July 18th-19th 2016

Heavily populated area

In the second-highest casualty toll admitted by the US to date, it now admits 15 civilians died in a controversial airstrike on a moving vehicle in the village of Al Ghandourra in Aleppo province, Syria on July 28th.

According to local accounts at least 22 named civilians, including children, were killed when missiles hit the main market and elementary school in the town, which at the time was occupied by ISIL. Graphic footage posted after the attack showed the lifeless bodies of children, and corpses still flaming.

The Coalition itself now says 15 civilians were killed “during a strike on a moving ISIL vehicle… when the munition struck the vehicle after it slowed in a populated area after the munition was released.”

In a follow up response, a Coalition spokesperson told Airwars that the vehicle, which allegedly contained ISIL fighters, “was targeted and [the] weapon launched to time the vehicle passing between two populated areas. After weapon was released the vehicle slowed before exiting the first populated area.”

It remains unclear why the US targeted the vehicle in a heavily populated area – regardless of whether it was moving or stopped.

Neil Sammonds, lead researcher on Amnesty’s investigations into both strikes, said despite the Coalition’s recognition of both incidents, significant questions remained.

“With al-Tukhar, Al-Ghandoura and other ‘admissions’ of civcas through Centcom/DoD investigations, one of our main underlying concerns is the lack of evidence for how their findings were reached,” Sammonds told Airwars in an email. “Research by monitoring groups found several times as much civcas for Al-Tukhar, and twice as many civilian fatalities for Al-Ghandoura. Regretfully the US authorities have not shared the evidence they have so we can not compare it with ours.”

The Al-Ghandoura attack was one of 11 incidents – with some 300 reported civilian casualties – that Sammonds and Amnesty presented to US officials in September. Despite recent meetings with the Defense and State Departments, Sammonds added, “we have not as yet found anyone able to discuss the substance of any one of those attacks, which included Al-Ghandoura.”

Satellite image of the strike in al-Ghandoura shows it took place in a heavily populated area. Original image captured by Amnesty International from DigitalGlobe/Google Earth. Red graphic added by Amnesty International.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=O5CCo54svFU

EXTREMELY GRAPHIC: Aftermath of al-Ghandoura strike, posted by ISIL-linked al A’amaq

Unknown events

Of the seven civilian casualty events admitted by the Coalition in December, two were previously unknown to Airwars researchers. Their inclusion most likely resulted from American pilot and analysis accounts, and post-strike footage review.

A May 16th 2016 strike near as Shadadi had not previously been tracked by Airwars. The Coalition now reports that “during a strike on seven ISIL fighters in a moving vehicle, it was assessed that two civilians were inadvertently killed. One civilian passenger in the vehicle was killed and one civilian riding a motorcycle was killed when he came into proximity of the ISIL vehicle after the munition was released.” Airwars researchers have subsequently found three brief Arabic-language reports which corroborate the incident, though none made mention of civilian casualties at the time.

Also included among the seven confirmed cases is the first admission of civilian deaths from US artillery. That incident took place on March 31st 2016 near Sala Heya, Syria according to the December 1st release, which said operators of a counter-battery artillery killed three civilians near the site of an ISIL mortal launch targeting “friendly forces.”

Reports from the time indicated only that warplanes – some suggesting the Assad regime – had bombed the area; Locals and monitors appeared oblivious to having been targeted by US artillery that day.

An M777 A2 Howitzer is fired at night in support of Iraqi security forces (Library picture via US Army)

Though the Coalition almost always admits to a lower civilian toll than local reports indicate, some incidents do suggest multiple culprits – in particular with recent strikes said to have involved Turkey. In its latest release, the Coalition admits that “one civilian was inadvertently killed as a result of the blast following the strike” on suspected ISIL fighters near Thaltanah village in Aleppo on October 4th 2016.

Airwars monitoring suggests as many as 19 civilians were killed at Thaltanah that day including three children, along with 41 people reported injured. Multiple accounts implicated Ankarra in the attack, which has launched a unilateral action in northern Syria involving Turkish special forces, shelling and airstrikes in support of Free Syrian Army ground forces.

Monitors offered conflicting assessments at the time: the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights reported that airstrikes on Thaltanah on October 4th were carried out “likely by Turkish warplanes” while the Syrian Network for Human Rights blamed the Coalition (as did ISIS).

Reflecting the confusion on the ground, al Jazeera cited the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights, writing “it was unclear whether the strike was carried out by the US-led coalition fighting ISIL, or Turkey.” In light of the Coalition’s admission, it appears possible that both could be true.

Underreporting

Also included in the first Coalition civilian casualty report were twelve incidents which it has determined could not be credibly blamed on its forces. The allegations were discarded for several reasons: because no Coalition strikes took place in the area; due to a lack of available evidence to determine credibility; or because further Coalition analysis of the strike determined that only ISIL fighters died.

Overall, the Coaltion identified eleven alleged civilian casualty events in Iraq and Syria for October 2016 – the key period covered by its first report. Airwars itself has tracked 51 alleged Coalition civilian casualty incidents and two ‘friendly fire’ events for the same period.

As Airwars noted in followup correspondence with the Coalition, “We presently assess 20 of these 51 incidents as fairly reported (that is, having likely caused civilian casualties) on top of the three events so far confirmed by the US. Overall then, last week’s press release referenced just 20 per cent of known claimed civilian casualty incidents in Iraq and Syria for October.”

▲ US soldiers fire a M777 A2 Howitzer in support of Operation Inherent Resolve, Iraq, November 2016. (U.S. Army photo by Spc. Christopher Brecht)

Civilian casualties are now Trump’s problem to solve

Published

December 9, 2016

Written by

Samuel Oakford

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During his campaign for President, Donald Trump promised to “bomb the shit” out of the Islamic State, and target the families of accused terrorists – an outright violation of international law. He advocated that the US begin waterboarding detainees once more, and suggested other forms of torture be employed.

This month, after a single short meeting with retired US Marine Corps General James Mattis, Trump said he may rethink his position on waterboarding – convinced by the man he has nominated for Defense Secretary that “beer and cigarettes” may be just as effective as what American officials have termed “enhanced interrogation techniques.”

Trump’s erratic behavior has left advocates for civilians in conflict struggling to guess what White House policies they should steel themselves for over the next four years. One question in particular lingers: how will Trump approach an executive order issued this July by President Obama, which appears to be having a noticeable influence on the US approach to non-combatant deaths.

Executive order 13732 lays out the US approach to civilian casualties across multiple conflict zones including Iraq and Syria, as well as in countries like Pakistan and Yemen where the US carries out covert drone strikes.

Obama instructed “all relevant agencies” to take precautions to reduce the likelihood of civilian casualties, and to conduct assessments “that assist in the reduction of civilian casualties by identifying risks to civilians and evaluating efforts to reduce risks to civilians.” The July 1st order includes a wide range of best practice ranging from the training of Pentagon and CIA staff, to developing and acquiring greater intelligence in the field with an eye to protecting non-combatants.

The order also instructs government agencies investigating civilian casualty incidents to incorporate “credible information from all sources” including NGOs – as well as to share best practice with foreign partners, and to work with the Red Cross to “assist in efforts to distinguish between military objectives and civilians.” Government agencies are also required where relevant to acknowledge responsibility and offer condolence payments to victims or their families, in the event that civilians are killed or injured.

Bombs are loaded aboard the aircraft carrier USS Dwight D. Eisenhower in October 2016. With more than 50,000 US munitions so far dropped on Iraq and Syria, civilian casualties are inevitable (U.S. Navy/ Petty Officer 3rd Class Andrew J. Sneeringer)

Big signal

In some respects, the order solidifies steps that the military had begun to adopt after mounting civilian deaths in 21st century conflict zones – particularly Afghanistan, where reviews led to new directives seeking to limit civilian casualties from certain military maneuvers. For those who had pressured the Bush and Obama administrations for years to reform their civilian casualty rules and offer greater transparency, the recent executive order has been significant.

“To me it’s a pretty big signal to the rest of the world that the US takes seriously civilian harm that it causes and tries to minimize that harm as much as possible,” said Sarah Holewinski, former director of the Center for Civilians in Conflict and a State Department official until last year. “Taking away the executive order would be just [the same] as creating it – it would send a message.”

The Trump transition team did not answer multiple requests from Airwars to clarify how it may approach the executive order or civilian casualties more broadly. The President-elect’s appointed national security adviser, retired Gen. Michael Flynn, also did not respond to requests for comment. Michael Ledeen, who recently co-authored a book with Flynn on how to win “the global war against radical Islam,” said in an email to Airwars that civilian casualty policy was “way outside” of his own expertise.

Flynn – whose disparaging remarks about Muslims, reported attempts to blame Iran for the Benghazi attacks while head of the Defense Intelligence Agency, and conspiracy theories shared on social media have raised substantial concerns – has in the past described the US’s widespread use of drone targeted killing as wrongheaded.

“We’ve tended to say, drop another bomb via a drone and put out a headline that ‘we killed Abu Bag of Doughnuts’ and it makes us all feel good for 24 hours,” Flynn told the Intercept in an interview last year. “And you know what? It doesn’t matter. It just made them a martyr, it just created a new reason to fight us even harder.”

Laura Pitter, senior national security counsel at Human Rights Watch, says there is hope that both Mattis and even Flynn – and the military establishment at large – could serve as checks on Trump’s more volatile impulses.

“Once he [Trump] is in a position where he is actually involved in carrying out some of the policies that he’s talked about, he’s going to get contrary advice to what he’s been saying on the campaign trail,” Pitter said in an interview with Airwars. To do away with the executive order, she added, “would be very unwise.”

Wreckage of vehicles destroyed in an airstrike on Raqqa, Syria on April 1st 2016 which the US now admits killed at least three civilians (Picture courtesy of Raqqa is Being Slaughtered Silently)

‘Humane aspect’

Earlier this year, Airwars director Chris Woods met with top officials at US Central Command in Tampa, who insisted that civilian harm mitigation is central to the strategy of the anti-ISIL Coalition currently bombing both Iraq and Syria.

“It wouldn’t make operational sense to just go into this bombing left and right you know – wiping out ISIL at the expense of the civilian population,” said a senior CENTCOM official. “So there’s a humane aspect to it but also an operational aspect to it.”

Those remarks are published in Limited Accountability, a wide-ranging Airwars audit of the US-led Coalition’s air campaign against ISIL. Among other findings, official estimates of civilian deaths per airstrike in Iraq and Syria are found to be far lower than for other recent US campaigns, including secretive drone strikes in Pakistan, Yemen and Somalia.

In Afghanistan, where the UN has tracked civilian deaths from international airstrikes since 2009, one civilian died on average every 10 to 14 airstrikes between 2010 and 2014. As the audit notes, “Similar civilian fatality ratios if applied to Iraq and Syria – a hot war involving thousands of Coalition airstrikes on urban centres – would lead to expectations of 1,500 deaths or more in the first two years of strikes. This is precisely what the public record indicates.”

Instead, the Coalition has acknowledged only 173 civilian deaths since the start of its air campaign over two years ago – all admitted to by the United States.

Yet there are signs that the recent Obama executive order is nudging the military towards a greater degree of transparency. More than 120 of those US-admitted deaths in Iraq and Syria were confirmed just in the past five weeks. And starting in December, CENTCOM handed over publication duties to the Coalition, which will now release monthly updates on reported allegations – assuming the new administration doesn’t step in the way.

Though CENTCOM has turned over responsibility for investigations to the Coalition (whose main staff are principally American), there are few signs that other members of the Coalition are intent on divulging the results of their own civilian casualty investigations. To date, non have admitted civilian victims resulting from their strikes. As the December 12th Airwars audit notes, “it is unacceptable that major democracies such as Belgium, the Netherlands, Australia and Denmark have chosen to wage semi-secret conventional wars – with affected civilians on the ground, citizens at home and monitoring agencies unable to hold these governments to account.”

During the audit – at the request of CENTCOM officials – Airwars provided detailed information on 438 publicly alleged civilian casualties tracked to that point. As the now-published report details, “a number of new incidents of potential concern were flagged [by CENTCOM] which were then sent out for assessment and possible investigation.”

These steps, halting as they are, encourage advocates. But could they withstand a President who seems capable of undoing eight years of careful Presidential policy-making with a phone call and a few tweets?

Therein lies the fragility of an executive order – an order which a successor President can reverse at will.

“The DoD has done a lot of good things, but it is our view that these are not yet enshrined in policy to the point where 20 years from now when current soldiers and officers are gone, these things will be remembered,” said Marla Keenan, Director of Programs at the Center for Civilians in Conflict.

Coalition leaflets dropped on the town of al Mayadeen in Syria on September 9th 2016 warned civilians of impending airstrikes (via Syrian Observatory for Human Rights)

‘Hard to ignore’

After the release of the latest batch of civilian casualty investigations on December 1st, Airwars spoke with Colonel John J. Thomas, the chief spokesperson for CENTCOM. Thomas, who served in both Iraq and Afghanistan, said that particularly during his deployment to Kabul in 2007, officials began to see “that civilian casualties threaten an entire coalition.”

Echoing Keenan, Thomas said that in an organization as large as the US military, where soldiers rotate and officials come and go at the Pentagon, “priorities shift and people get busy with things.” Without the executive order, focus and institutional memory could wane.

“When it’s clearly put in front of you, that this is one of the things you must take the time to look at, it makes a difference,” the colonel noted.

“What the executive order does is it gives us permission in a sense to dedicate the resources,” Thomas added. “What this has given us the opportunity to do is look backwards and understand what has happened in these specific instances and also gives us a better chance of learning from them.”

“When someone like Airwars brings us info that we weren’t even aware of… we check it out against our strike list,” he said.

“It’s good to have the priorities clear,” he added, comparing the order to Freedom of Information Laws. “It’s hard to ignore an executive order on a specific issue.”

Airwars director Chris Woods, who authored the transparency audit released on December 12th, said that Obama’s executive order had a demonstrable effect over the course of the study.

“Back in May we assessed CENTCOM’s casualty monitoring process as pretty much unfit for purpose. Sixty per cent of claims weren’t being looked at, and most that were were dismissed out of hand within a day or so. More recently we’ve seen the US military reaching out to external monitors like ourselves – and adopting a more systematic approach to casualty counting. The State Department also has a formal civilian casualty monitoring role – and just unveiled a new reporting mechanism for NGOs.”

As President Obama leaves office, he will pass broad military powers to his successor. Civilian casualties will continue to occur, however President Trump approaches the issue. But for advocates on behalf of civilians affected by war, the task of engaging with the incoming administration could be difficult.

“For the human rights community, with Flynn, for Mattis, for Trump and whoever becomes Secretary of State, we have to get back to basics and get smarter about our arguments,” says Sarah Holewinski. “We had 8 years of being invited to meetings at the Obama White House and talking over the particulars of an executive order. When it comes to the Trump administration, we have to hold our arguments in very basic terms, about why causing civilian harm is detrimental to our national security, and why addressing those things are important to American identity.”

▲ President Barack Obama looks at his watch as he walks along the Colonnade to the Oval Office, March 2, 2015. (Official White House by Chuck Kennedy)

First full month of battle for Mosul leaves hundreds of civilians dead

Published

December 6, 2016

Written by

Samuel Oakford

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Hundreds of civilians have already been credibly reported killed in the ongoing battle to recapture Mosul from Islamic State fighters, according to an Airwars assessment – slain by airstrikes, mortar and artillery fire, and in street battles.

Airwars’ Iraq researcher has travelled to the frontlines regularly during the past seven weeks. He reports an increasingly dire situation, as tens of thousands of civilians flee Mosul, and ISIL shelling intensifies. Since November 20th alone, he estimates that more than 100 civilians may have been killed in fighting. The Washington Post meanwhile has reported that the number of civilian victims may be as many as 600 since mid-October, according to one of its sources.

“ISIL is using new tactics, targeting liberated areas of the city, street by street, and targeting main squares in liberated neighborhoods” said Airwars’ Iraq researcher, referring to the terror group’s use of mortars. “I think that will stop or delay Iraqi army offensives.”

In addition, airstrikes appear to have led to dozens of civilian deaths since October 17th. Through November 30th, Airwars has recorded a total of 41 alleged Coalition civilian casualty incidents in and around Mosul. Between them these claim as many as 318 civilian deaths. After reviewing and grading each incident, researchers at Airwars believe the likely civilian toll from Coalition airstrikes and artillery during the battle for Mosul presently stands at 98 to 101 killed – with 202 injured – including eight deaths so far conceded by the US.

Dr. Safwan Imad, reportedly killed in an air raid on his neighborhood in Mosul on November 16th. Courtesy of @othmanmhmmadr.

At the outset of the Mosul assault, Coalition commander Lt. Gen Stephen Townsend said the battle would likely continue for weeks. Iraqi officials now hint the campaign may take six months. On November 30th they claimed that some 19 neighborhoods – representing about 30 percent of the eastern side of Mosul – had been recaptured since Coalition-backed operations began on October 17th. But gains have slowed significantly during November.

Iraqi officials, for their part, say they are going slower to prevent civilian deaths. But they have also sent conflicting messages to locals caught in the crossfire, first instructing them to stay in their homes (evidently in the hope they would revolt against ISIL), only to later reconsider that advice as casualties grew and progress into the city slowed in densely populated areas. According to the UN more than 77,000 people have so far been displaced by fighting; humanitarian officials say they are still unprepared for a massive exodus of a half million or more Mosul civilians.

Litany of ISIL crimes

UN human rights monitoring seen by Airwars shows a litany of ongoing crimes committed by ISIL fighters. Doctors and elderly Moslawi killed by snipers; children shot down as they attempt to flee towards Iraqi Security Forces (ISF); car bombs claiming civilians in residential areas.

The deadliest weapon used by ISIL continues to be indiscriminate shelling, especially in areas recaptured by Iraqi Security Forces (ISF.) On November 17th, 31 civilians, including eight children were reportedly killed when ISIL shelled the government-controlled neighborhood of al-Bakir. Another attack in eastern Mosul on November 23rd, reportedly claimed the lives of 11 civilians, including 4 women and 2 children.

The US-led Coalition, which has bombed ISIL targets in Iraq for more than two years, has intensified its campaign in and around Mosul. Through November 28th, the Coalition reported 212 separate strikes in support of operations to recapture the city. A strike as defined by the Coalition ranges from a single bomb dropped by a jet to multiple planes partaking in a raid or unleashing sustained fire.

Prior to October, Mosul was already the site of more than 400 likely civilian deaths from Coalition airstrikes, according to the best estimates of Airwars researchers. This was the highest figure for any location across Iraq and Syria. In previous investigations, relatives of those inside the city described a constant barrage of rockets and bombs that rained down on the city from November 2014. That pace has only increased since October 17th. According to the Coalition, more than 4,900 munitions have been “delivered” in support of the Iraqi operation to recapture Mosul.

Airwars’ Iraq researcher reports that US attack helicopters were also being used more heavily towards the end of November, as close quarter fighting rendered airstrikes less effective and more deadly to civilians.

A 10-year old boy injured in fighting in Mosul’s Shishan neighbourhood on November 14th 2016 (Airwars photo)

“That move into an urban environment means that the tempo of our strikes is generally going to decrease,” Coalition chief spokesman Colonel John Dorrian told Airwars in a recent interview. ‘That’s because you have to be more careful and you probably will see fewer opportunities to take that shot against an enemy.”

Dorrian added that Coalition members may elect to use small munitions as the operation intensifies, moving from 2,000 pound bombs to ones weighing several hundred pounds. “Obviously as you get into the urban environment it is appropriate,” he said.

Eight deaths admitted

The Coalition has so far admitted to just eight civilian deaths from its Mosul campaign – all in a bombing that took place on October 22nd in Fadhiliya, outside Mosul, which killed an entire family. Iraq-based reporter Fazel Hawramy had obtained eyewitness testimony, published in the Guardian, which brought the attack to the attention of Coalition officials.

Bodies of a family of eight are removed from the rubble of their home in Fadhiliya, Iraq following a confirmed Coalition airstrike on the evening of October 22nd 2016 (Picture courtesy of Fazel Hawramy)

Other civilian casualty incidents, particularly those inside ISIL-controlled neighborhoods of Mosul, do not benefit from similar in-depth reporting. Accounts that do emerge may include information or video from ISIL-controlled outlets.

On November 18th, at least seven civilians were reportedly killed and 14 injured in what local accounts reported as Coalition bombings, though other accounts only referred to as “heavy shelling.” Though initial reports cited ISIL-linked sources, Airwars researchers were able to find additional reports that also blamed the Coalition.

In other cases, a single report – even if from a highly credible source – can be insufficient to determine what occurred. On November 13th, the Norwegian Refugee Council tweeted that a father told them “3 family members were killed” and a mother and 2 children badly burnt when their home in eastern Mosul was shelled. It is unclear who was responsible. A number of other events have been also been reported by word of mouth to Airwars, either by Iraqi forces or by affected civilians.

Though the UN monitors civilian casualties, it generally does not assign blame for airstrikes – leaving it unclear if an attack is carried out by the Coalition or the Iraqi Air Force. Some incidents – like an October 21st bombing that killed 15 women in Duquq (south of Kirkuk) were originally blamed on the Coalition but later linked to the Iraqi Air Force. Recent attacks in Tal Afar – carried out as part of the Mosul campaign – have also seen blame contested between the Coalition and Iraq government.

A father and his seven children were reportedly killed in this incident near Mosul on October 24th by an alleged Coalition strike (still from Al A’Amaq propaganda video, via Youtube)

Given reporting limitations, international monitors meanwhile have had difficulty in evaluating more than a handful of cases. Human Rights Watch recently released an investigation into an October 18th bombing south of Mosul that left eight civilians dead. The airstrike targeted ISIL, who had commandeered a medical clinic in the town of Hammam al-Alil. The precision attack also killed two ISIL fighters, as well as its transport minister. Human Rights Watch has called on both the Iraqi government and the Coalition to investigate.

Belkis Wille, Iraq researcher at Human Rights Watch, said investigations are exceedingly challenging in and around Mosul right now: “Because of the different types of attacks being carried out by ISIS, Iraqi and KRG forces, and the Coalition, it is extremely difficult for human rights workers to identify why a civilian was wounded or died during the course of the battle,” Wille told Airwars.

“In addition, even where we can, because of the dangers of working along the frontline, it is very difficult for us to identify whether there was a legitimate military target in the area, and therefore whether the attack was lawful or not.”

Difficulties in tracking casualties and those responsible could not come at a worse time for civilians in both Iraq and Syria. According to Airwars researchers, November saw record number of civilian casualty claims involving both the US-led Coalition, and Russian forces operating in Syria.

Coalition admits four key allies killed at least 15 Syrian troops in botched raid

Published

November 29, 2016

Written by

Samuel Oakford

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The US has admitted that its forces and those of three key anti-ISIL Coalition allies – the UK, Australia and Denmark – took part in bombings that mistakenly killed at least 15 Syrian regime forces on September 17th near Deir Ezzor.

In a briefing with reporters on November 29th, chief investigator Brigadier General Richard Coe said that after initially determining incorrectly that a vehicle being tracked belonged to ISIL, “confirmation bias” and other failures led Coalition analysts to assume that additional forces seen being friendly to the vehicle’s occupants also belonged to the militant group.

Drone surveillance had begun a day earlier on September 16th, and continued until the strikes commenced at 13:55 local time. One analyst viewing video of the scene remotely – noting the presence of a tank in the vicinity – wrote in a military chat room that “What we are looking at can’t possibly be ISIL.” But his assessment was ignored.

27 minutes on hold

According to an investigation conducted by CENTCOM, shortly before the raid began “a possible flag was called out” in the target area. But “the call went unacknowledged due to human factors, to include task saturation and target fixation.” In other words, Coalition personnel were too busy, and too focused on a target that they had already decided was ISIL.

The US took the unprecedented step of notifying the Russian government prior to the impending attack, but provided incorrect coordinates. This led Russian officials to believe the target was in fact several kilometers distant.

As soon as Russia learnt its Syrian allies were in trouble it used a special ‘deconfliction hotline’ manned by American personnel. But it took almost half an hour for the message to get through. According to US investigators, the Russians wanted to speak with a specific liaison officer – and when he was unavailable they reportedly hung up and called back later. When the official was still unavailable during the second call, Russia was put on hold.

A total of 27 minutes would pass before the Coalition was finally warned and was able to take steps to halt the raid. During that time, multiple additional strikes took place.

In total, Coalition planes belonging to the US, the UK, Australia and Denmark dropped 34 guided bombs and fired 380 additional rounds of 30mm munitions on the Syrian camp. F-16s, A-10s, FA/18s and Reaper drones were all involved in the raid.

Though CENTCOM did not provide breakdowns of the 37 total “strikes” or munition releases by country, Denmark has publicly stated that it dropped five bombs on four vehicles during the raid.

A spokesperson for the UK Ministry of Defense told Airwars that its remotely piloted Reaper drones also fired munitions, adding that “We would not and did not intentionally strike known Syrian Regime military units.”

And in a statement, the Australian Department of Defence said that two of its FA/18As took part in the raid, which was supervised by the Combined Air Operations Center (CAOC) in Qatar. Australia stressed that the airstrikes “were conducted in full compliance with the rules of engagement and the laws of armed conflict.”

The three US allies have made much until now of their accuracy in the war against ISIL, claiming to have killed or injured no civilians despite more than 1,800 airstrikes between them.

Part of the heavily redacted CENTCOM report into the September 17th botched raid

Previously killed

According to a brief and heavily redacted summary of the CENTCOM investigation, for those at the CAOC on September 17th it had been “unclear who had the responsibility/authority to decide between continuing deliberate target development versus conducting a dynamic strike.” Investigators warned that though the complex raid had been botched on this occasion, “it is likely that this type of targeting will become increasingly common.”

Brig. General Coe said that CENTCOM was able to substantiate 15 deaths on the ground, but believed more Syrian forces were likely killed. While US investigators claimed that the individuals targeted were not in regular military uniforms, they did accept that the troops killed were allied to President Bashir’s forces.

Others have placed the death toll far higher than 15. The Syrian Observatory for Human Rights reported that 90 died, while Russian officials said 62 were killed in the raid. Media outlets close to the regime named 47 personnel, including 12 senior officers.

However, there are indications that at least some of the named victims had in fact died in previous incidents.

As first reported by Zaman al Wasl, named officers couldn’t possibly have been in Deir Ezzor on September 17th. Airwars monitoring of press reports and social media dating back to 2014 also suggests that each officer named in pro-regime accounts had been reported as killed at other times during the war in Syria.

A June 30th, 2015 post by the Syrian Revolution Network indicated that Major General Soheil Ibrahim Oran had died that month. His death was also reported by a pro-regime Facebook account.

Major-General Yasin Abdo Maala was originally reported killed in May 2015 and a mourning notice published that summer. Colonel Talib Khair-Bik, the third officer listed by regime-allied websites, had been reported killed in Deir Ezzor in early 2015. Airwars researchers were able to find death reports or memorials (often on Facebook) for all of the nine other officers initially listed as killed in the Coalition strikes.

Zaman al Wasli also reported that several infantry soldiers listed as being killed in the September 17th raid had appeared in earlier coverage indicating their deaths in battle. Researchers at Airwars were unable to confirm widespread patterns among the non-officers listed on regime-connected website.

Major General Yassin Abdo Maala, who actually died in May 2015 (Picture via All 4 Syria)

‘Lessons learned’

In a statement, CENTCOM identified the following “lessons learned and areas for improvement in the targeting process:”

* A recommended review of the hybrid targeting process used in the strike – a mixture of the days- or weeks-long “deliberate targeting” process, and the accelerated process generally used for fast-emerging “dynamic targets.” Harrigian has already ordered such a review.

* Improved information sharing among analysts to guard against the human factors that led to the strike.

* A more effective lessons-learned process in the CAOC to better avoid repeating mistakes.

* Enhanced use of the U.S.-Russia safety de-confliction hotline established under the two nations’ Flight Safety Memorandum of Understanding, to ensure that critical information is communicated more quickly to available personnel.

The Deir Ezzor incident is the second ‘friendly force’ event so far confirmed by the Coalition. In December 2015, at least nine and as many as 23 Iraqi soldiers died when they were mistakenly bombed near Fallujah.

▲ Australian FA/18s were among multiple Coalition aircraft from four nations which killed at least 15 Syrian troops in error in a September 17th 2016 raid (Library picture via Australian MoD)

Admitted US strike near a Syrian mosque highlights continued risk to civilians

Published

November 16, 2016

Written by

Samuel Oakford

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On November 9th, as the world’s media scrambled to come to terms with a Donald Trump presidency in the United States, US Central Command quietly released the largest batch yet of civilian casualty reports from its anti-ISIL operations.

Controversially, among those cases admitted by the US was a strike next to a Syrian mosque which killed at least three bystanders, raising questions about how such attacks are vetted.

The latest US casualty admissions – posted online at 4pm Washington DC time on the day of the election results – list 24 civilian casualty incidents in Iraq and Syria including 64 newly conceded deaths and eight injuries. The release more than doubled the 55 civilian deaths CENTCOM had previously conceded.

The new combined tally of 119 civilian deaths – all admitted by the US – still falls far short of what researchers at Airwars estimate to be a minimum casualty figure of more than 1,800 fatalities in Iraq and Syria.

Some of the deadliest alleged recent incidents have yet to be accounted for, including a series of attacks during the Coalition-backed summer campaign to capture Manbij in Syria. While there are nine admitted deaths from four US strikes near Manbij included in this latest CENTCOM admission, that figure is still far below most public estimates.

In October, Amnesty International released its own detailed investigation into Coalition strikes in Syria which determined more than 100 civilians had died in just three attacks during the Manbij campaign, including at least 73 non-combatants in a strike on al-Tokhar on July 19th. CENTCOM says it is still investigating those allegations. But US officials have already hinted they don’t believe widespread local reporting or Amnesty’s account, telling the Washington Post’s Missy Ryan that only “about 10 civilians may have died” at al-Tokhar.

In one case CENTCOM has now conceded, it says ten civilians died in a US airstrike on Mosul on March 5th 2016. While that tally is the largest so far admitted to in a single event, the true number of those killed that day is likely to be far higher.

According to multiple reports at the time, at least 21 civilians died in the Mosul attack – all of them named. They included Ghazala Ali Fathi Zeidan, her husband and their three children. As NRN News reported on the day, “the Coalition targeted an old industrial plant in eastern Mosul, killing 10 Daesh militants… Our correspondent also said that the bombing killed and wounded more than 20 civilians from displaced families from western Sunni areas, who were living in the buildings.”

Destruction in an industrial area of Mosul following a US air raid on March 5th, 2016. The attack killed as many as 21 civilians, though CENTCOM concedes only ten deaths. (Picture courtesy of NRN News)

External sources

Departing from previous releases, CENTCOM says its latest disclosure has for the first time made use of “an exhaustive review of reports from outside sources from news media reports, non-governmental organizations and other U.S. Government departments and agencies.” Journalists were told that Airwars itself was one of those sources.

For casualty monitors this is seen as an important step – one which they have long pushed for. While the US stands alone in admitting to casualties among foreign powers bombing Syria and Iraq – including Russia and other members of the Coalition – human rights advocates say published US accounts are still missing important legal context.

“In some cases, DoD [Department of Defense] has reviewed and assessed their attacks to be lawful even while acknowledging civilians were killed. But we don’t know how they came to those conclusions, and basic details are missing from their explanations,” said Naureen Shah, Director of Amnesty International USA’s Security and Human Rights Program, in an interview with Airwars.

“They are not providing their assessments in any way that we could evaluate from an international humanitarian law perspective,” she added

An April 1st 2016 strike on Raqqa in Syria highlights such concerns. CENTCOM says a US raid targeting an “ISIL tactical unit” in the city is now assessed to have killed three civilians “after entering the target area after the aircraft released its weapon.”

That scenario – of civilians appearing shortly after a bomb has been dropped – is commonly cited by CENTCOM, and was noted in 13 of the 24 summaries issued on November 9th. However, local reports already compiled by Airwars indicate that the April 1st raid on Raqqa may have been reckless.

One account from Bas News said the strike was aimed at two cars belonging to members of ISIL, but targeted them “after Friday prayer near al Nour mosque”. While three senior terrorist leaders were reported killed, civilians also died.

Pictures posted by Raqqa is Being Slaughtered Silently show the attack took place on a narrow street, immediately between the mosque and other buildings, and destroyed five or more vehicles. The monitoring group named one innocent victim as Hamidi Abboud al Hamidi – with some accounts putting the civilian death toll as high as five, with 30 more injured.

Interior of the al Nour mosque covered in broken glass, shortly after a US airstrike on April 1st 2016, (Picture courtesy of Raqqa is Being Slaughtered Silently)

Attacks on mosques and other places of worship are generally prohibited by the laws of war. According to Pentagon policy guidance, “No-Strike entities are those designated by the appropriate authority upon which kinetic or non-kinetic operations are prohibited to avoid violating international law, conventions, or agreements, or damaging relations with coalition partners and indigenous populations.” These include religious buildings, though it is unclear if the al Nour mosque in Raqqa had been specifically listed for protection by the Coalition.

CENTCOM now says that the April 1st attack was not pre-planned but instead a “dynamic strike that strictly adhered to all our civilian casualty processes and complied with the Law of Armed Conflict.”

“Unfortunately, civilians appeared in the target area after the weapon was released and we did not have an opportunity to ‘shift cold’ the weapon elsewhere,” a spokesperson told Airwars.

Given the location and timing of the attack, question marks remain about how aware US forces were of the immediate environment. This was an area where civilians were likely to be present around Friday prayers – and where multiple other vehicles with unknown occupants were less than a car’s length from the reported target, along a narrow urban street.

The exact US military calculus used to determine the basis for such controversial airstrikes remains unclear.

As locals look on at the destruction left by a US airstrike, the al Nour mosque’s distinctive windows can clearly be seen immediately behind (Picture courtesy of Raqqa is Beng Slaughtered Silently)

No hurry to declare

Airwars has now conducted an assessment of all 24 new events conceded by CENTCOM on November 9th, to track military claims against the public record.

Analysis shows the US is still in little hurry to declare civilian deaths. The average time between a non-combatant being killed and the US publicly admitting the fact remains roughly five months – a decrease of about 20 days on average compared to previously released incidents, but still significantly longer than what human rights monitors consider reasonable. The most recent event took place on September 10th in Raqqa, Syria. “During a strike against an ISIL target, it is assessed that five civilians were killed,” CENTCOM now says.

Even so, the US remains the only member of the 13-nation Coalition to have conceded any civilian casualties after 26 months of war – despite more than 3,600 airstrikes to date by the US’s allies across Iraq and Syria.

As with previous releases, around half of the events in the latest batch of US casualty admissions were never publicly reported at the time. For example CENTCOM reports that one civilian was killed in a September 7th strike near Deir Ezzor after “entering the target area after the aircraft released its weapon.” A lack of outside reporting at the time indicates this assessment was likely based entirely on video taken from the aircraft, along with any related battlefield intelligence available.

While these unreported cases show that US pilots and analysts are coming forward internally to report their concerns, they may also indicate that civilian deaths are being significantly under-reported – particularly in Iraq, where there are fewer monitors working to document civilians killed by the fighting.

In those admitted incidents which had been reported at the time, public accounts often differ wildly from US military claims. April 9th strikes on Mosul telephone exchanges and banks killed anywhere from two to 67 civilians according to locals. The US itself now admits that “during a strike against an ISIL tactical unit, it is assessed that one civilian was killed after entering the target area after the aircraft released its weapon.“

One of at least four telephone exchanges destroyed in co-ordinated airstrikes on Mosul on April 9th. Anywhere from 1 to 67 civilians died. (Photo courtesy of NRN News)

The US has also conceded that it was in fact responsible for at least eight civilian deaths in Syria, which were blamed at the time on Russia.

A US raid led to the deaths of five civilians and the injuring of three others near Deir ez-Zor on November 20th 2015, CENTCOM now admits. A year ago that attack was widely held to be the work of Russia.

More civilians were killed by the US near Raqqa on June 21st 2016. As CENTCOM now notes, “During a strike targeting an ISIL headquarters building, it is assessed that three individuals were killed after entering the target area after the aircraft released its weapons.”

That toll is far below the 32 civilians – including 21 named by Raqqa is Being Slaughtered Silently – that locals said were killed.

Several media reports from the time blamed the attacks on Moscow – and it remains possible that both US and Russian airstrikes killed civilians in Raqqa that day since multiple sites were hit. The confusion underscores the challenges in monitoring airstrikes in Syria today – where the Coalition, Russia, the Syrian regime, Iran and Turkey all carry out attacks.

After two years of daily bombings, Mosul residents now face greatest danger

Published

November 6, 2016

Written by

Samuel Oakford

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The assault on Mosul by Iraqi and Kurdish forces – backed by the formidable air and artillery power of the US-led Coalition – marks the culmination of a two year campaign to oust so-called Islamic State from the country’s second city. Nowhere else in Syria or Iraq has been more bombed by the Coalition, and nowhere else has seen as many civilians likely killed by its actions. As the battle for control now enters Mosul’s suburbs, Airwars examines the price already paid by the city’s people – and at what might lay ahead.

Noora is still brought to tears at the mention of her preschool-age cousin, who was killed along with the girl’s mother during airstrikes on ISIL-controlled Mosul last year. A series of attacks appeared to target a site used by fighters from the group, but also ended up killing a number of nearby residents. Noora’s cousin was upstairs in the family home when her mother ran to retrieve her after an initial blast. They were both cut down by another explosion. “I’ll never forget the day I found out,” Noora recalls. “I felt like the life was being sucked out of me.”

Noora, who was born in Mosul and now lives in the United Kingdom, stayed in touch by Whatsapp with her grandparents, aunt and other family members still in the city until the end of August, when the internet was largely cut off. They now stay in touch intermittently, only when those in Mosul feel safe enough to use their phones. This month, Noora found out that another relative in their twenties had been killed in the same way – an airstrike. Airwars has withheld identifying details of the strikes at the request of the family, who fear potential punishment by ISIL.

The deaths of three members of Noora’s family represent a fraction of the more than 450 civilians estimated by Airwars researchers to have been killed in US-led Coalition actions in and around Mosul since November 2014.

Intense bombing campaign

While monitoring is difficult and imprecise in Iraq, Airwars researchers have so far tracked and attempted to vet 110 separate claimed civilian casualty incidents in Mosul itself in two years of airstrikes. Those attacks are alleged to have killed up to 1,300 civilians between them. While that number is likely too high, the baseline assessment of 469 civilian deaths in Mosul to date would be the single largest toll anywhere in Iraq or Syria – and represents a quarter of all likely civilian deaths from Coalition operations across both countries.

According to Coalition officials, its forces had already carried out 1,906 airstrikes on Mosul before the operation to capture the city from ISIL began on October 17th. Those actions had seen more than 9,000 ordnance dropped on a city which by all accounts still holds a million or more civilians. A ‘strike’, however, can be anything from a single aircraft dropping a single bomb on a single target, to multiple jets attacking an array of targets. On October 21st, the Coalition’s daily report lists four airstrikes near Mosul, which actually hit a total of 90 targets.

Despite this intense bombing campaign, US officials have admitted to just five civilian deaths in the city resulting from four separate actions. Airwars has been informed by US Central Command (CENTCOM) of additional investigations that are “pending,” but there is no timetable for their release. Yet these heavy attacks on a densely populated city have taken a far heavier toll – whatever the Coalition’s public claims.

Scene of destruction in Mosul on August 15th 2016, after a reported Coalition strike targeting an ISIL-occupied office building also severely damaged surrounding areas (NRN News via Al A’Amaq propaganda)

On August 15th 2016 the Coalition reportedly launched a number of strikes in the heart of Mosul – apparently targeting an office building, but also heavily damaging nearby structures. At least seven civilians were killed according to local accounts, including a young girl named Tieba Ammar Nizar Hayali. Images taken from ISIL propaganda videos showed a gruesome scene, including injured children as as well what appear to be fighters. Local Facebook posts recorded the names of other civilian casualties. In its own published report for August 15th, the Coalition simply notes that “Near Mosul, one strike produced inconclusive results.”

The Coalition’s public narrative – and that of senior politicians in the alliance – is one of highly targeted precision strikes which only kill the enemy. The reality for the people of Mosul has often been very different. In at least one attack – the January bombing of an ISIL-controlled bank in central Mosul – US officials had reportedly “been willing to consider up to 50 civilian casualties” due to the importance of the target: not a high value enemy commander, but millions of dollars in cash.

Professor Dhafer Ramadan Al Badrani was reported killed in an alleged Coalition strike on Mosul University on March 22nd 2016 (via Bashar al Talib)

Versions of that casualty calculus are apparent in other attacks. A series of daytime airstrikes in March of this year targeted the campus of Mosul University, which before ISIL’s takeover was Iraq’s second largest. In a statement referencing strikes on March 19th, the Pentagon said that an ISIL “headquarters” was located on the campus and that the group “has also been using the buildings as training areas, weapon manufacturing and storage facilities and communication equipment hubs… the Mosul university strike met all criteria, and was coordinated with the Government of Iraq before striking.”

According to assessments compiled by Airwars researchers, 25 or more civilians were likely killed in airstrikes at the university on March 19th and 22nd, including several professors. Dr. Dhafer Ramadan Al Badrani (pictured), a former dean, reportedly died along with his wife and daughter.

Whatsapp war

While several Syrian monitoring groups have tracked and attempted to name tens of thousands of civilians killed in that country’s civil war, there is far less comprehensive reporting in Iraq. In Mosul journalism must also be done in secret, and carries lethal risks. Last year, ISIL executed dozens of activists who had posted reports from the city on social media.

All of this makes it less likely that Western outlets will carry news of civilian deaths in Mosul, a city controlled by apocalyptic terrorists. But the daily bombings – on average slightly more than three ‘strikes’ per day – are still being documented by Moslawis themselves, through social media and messaging apps, or by posting death notices on Facebook.

For over two years, Noora has been part of Whatsapp chat groups with her family in Mosul. Late in 2015 (a few weeks after the roundup and murder of local activists) every family member in Noora’s chat group agreed to delete their messages – littered with references to airstrikes – in order to protect those still in the city who feared ISIS fighters might find the exchanges. The family has however allowed Airwars to review some of the more recent messages.

A text from late 2015 reads: “airstrikes were very powerful by our house, and next to my family’s house and the rockets passed over our heads… may God protect us.” Another wrote, “We are used to it, but what scares me the most is the sound of the planes”

This summer, Noora’s grandmother wrote that a bomb had hit near to their home, though she assured her family it was “nothing.” When Airwars reviewed the incident, researchers determined that – based on local reports – nearly a dozen civilians had likely died, some of them possibly her grandmother’s neighbours. Noora now believes her grandmother was playing down both the toll and the danger posed to her, in an effort not to scare the family abroad and elsewhere in Iraq. “It’s crazy, they are worried about us,” Noora says.

Rasha al Aqeedi, a research fellow at Al Mesbar Studies and Research Center in Dubai and another native Moslawi, says her own family in Mosul have tolerated the strikes – as long as there weren’t civilian victims. “The strikes have been accurate despite the complexity of the situation,” she assessed in a comment to Airwars. However, al Aqeedi added that she recently learned from Facebook that a schoolmate and her father had been killed in an airstrike this summer.

‘Human shields’

As government and Peshmerga forces push into Mosul’s suburbs, ISIL has already forced tens of thousands of villagers to retreat with them – effectively using civilians as human shields against airstrikes and artillery blasts. On November 1st, the UN’s human rights office accused ISIL of attempting to bus 25,000 more people nearer to the city. “We have grave concern for the safety of these and tens of thousands of other civilians who have reportedly been forcibly relocated by ISIL,” said spokesperson Ravina Shamdasani.

The scenarios feared most by human rights officials – massive ground fighting and airstrikes in a city jammed with tens of thousands of Iraqis who are effectively prisoners, in addition to the million residents like Noora’s family who remain in Mosul – could be a disaster.

Already, the Coalition has massively increased its bombing campaign. After releasing 9,331 ordnance in and around Mosul over two years, the Coalition launched more than 1,400 in the span of just five days following the official start of Iraqi government and Kurdish attempts to recapture the city on October 17th.

An October 27th picture of bombs aboard the US aircraft carrier Dwight D. Eisenhower – which is supporting the ongoing Mosul operation (US Navy/ Petty Officer 3rd Class Andrew J. Sneeringer)

For those who have lived under ISIL’s brutal rule, airstrikes long ago became a daily fact of life, the roar of jets at night followed by explosions sometimes distant, sometimes close by – and sometimes the last thing people hear.

“They have been sleeping in their basement for months,” Noora said of her relatives, who are members of the city’s middle class, and are relatively secular. “I know people think strikes are just starting, but my family has been scared shitless for months.”

The UN, which attempts to track casualties in Iraq, says airstrikes are extremely difficult to qualify and assign blame for, especially in Mosul. The organization’s Iraqi mission, UNAMI, estimates that airstrikes have been responsible for around five percent of all civilian casualties in Iraq since June 2014, or slightly more than 1,000. However, the organisation does not generally attribute responsibility.

“There are many actors involved in airstrikes (Iraqi, Iranian, international coalition),” Francesco Motta, UNAMI’s human rights chief wrote in an email to Airwars. “This means that often when we get reports of airstrikes (and in those instances where we can in fact confirm through reliable sources that an airstrike has taken place – irrespective of the casualties) it is often impossible to determine who many have been responsible for it.”

Motta said most airstrikes happen at night – a fact confirmed by residents of Mosul – and by the time a bomb hits its target the plane could be long gone. “In the absence of verifiable film footage of the aircraft/strike it is often very difficult to ascertain what has happened,” he said.

Airwars obtained a recent internal UNAMI weekly human rights report which includes an entry for an airstrike on October 2nd that “allegedly killed 19 civilians, including children in Mosul.” Another airstrike in Mosul on October 8th targeting “a company that produces plant seeds in an industrial area,” is alleged to have killed 10 civilians. But the UN agency was unable to attribute responsibility in either case.

A recent strike near Kirkuk highlights the reporting problem. On October 21st, in the midst of an ISIL diversionary assault on the city, an airstrike hit a Shia mosque in the nearby town of Duquq, killing at least 15 women. Initial reports blamed the Coalition. But officials categorically denied involvement, and the Iraqi government later announced it would carry out an investigation. Some reports claim the Iraqi pilot and navigator responsible have now been detained.

https://twitter.com/Iraqiairforce/status/789440025108877313

The video shows a recent Iraqi Air Force strike on Mosul

Iraqi forces are also known to act more recklessly and, according to UNAMI, to rely heavily on dumb bombs instead of the guided munitions mainly employed by Coalition jets. In late June, as a massive ISIL convoy fled newly recaptured Fallujah, both US and and Iraqi aircraft opened fire on the vehicles. Said by Iraqi authorities to contain the families of fighters, the Coalition reported that it avoided parts of the convoy to minimize civilian casualties. Even so its claim to have destroyed 117 vehicles was high. Yet this paled against the 798 vehicles the Iraqi government says it destroyed, releasing video of its gunships firing at the convoys. The civilian toll of those attacks remains unclear.

On the frontline

However the Iraqi air force asserts itself, the US-led Coalition has and will continue to carry out the majority of airstrikes as allied troops push into Mosul. Already, several strikes in locations outside and within the city have resulted in civilian fatalities.

Airwars’ own Iraq-based researcher recently spent a week on the frontlines, where he saw entire villages destroyed by the fighting, and spoke with witnesses to airstrkes that left civilians dead. One, a local teacher, told Airwars that airstrikes on October 22nd or 23rd in the vicinity of Bashiqa left dead among several families. The teacher, from Bashiqa, described the ordeal he endured: “He told me how they survived and spent three nights under the stairs to avoid the airstrikes – airstrikes which targeted every moving thing in the village,” recalls the researcher.

Another incident in the village of Fadhiliya left eight members of a single family dead including three children. Uncovered by the Guardian, that incident left the family’s home reduced to rubble. The Coalition says it carried out strikes in the “area described in the allegation,” and is investigating.

Bodies are removed from the scene of a reported Coalition airstrike at Fadhiliya near Mosul, which killed eight members of one family on october 22nd 2016 (Picture courtesy of Fazel Hawramy)

As the battle for Mosul pushes into the city, air and artillery strikes risk killing many more civilians. ISIL has also telegraphed its intent to use non-combatants as ‘human shields’. In recent days the group’s fighters have executed hundreds, and brought tens of thousands more civilians with them as they have retreated from Mosul’s outlying villages.

“ISIL deliberately bases itself in civilian areas and civilian infrastructure (even within private homes and other infrastructure such as schools) with the direct intention of either ensuing civilian casualties if they are attacked or to shield their fighters,” noted Francesco Motta, UNAMI’s human rights chief.

Motta says the UN is also concerned about the continued enslavement of as many as 3,000 Yezidis, captured during ISIL’s blitz through northern Iraq in 2014. “We have serious concerns as to what ISIL might do to them if it looks like their control is about to collapse,” said Motta in an email earlier this month. “We fear that ISIL might decide to kill these people rather than see them freed.”

It is unclear how many Yazidis and other imprisoned civilians remain in Mosul, though they too could be placed near military targets. The UN recently warned that ISIL were holding “captive nearly 400 women from Kurdish, Yezidi or Shi’a Muslim communities in Tal Afar” – about 60km west of Mosul, and the site of Coalition strikes.

On November 1st, Iraqi troops first reportedly breached the official city limits. Still inside Mosul, Noora’s family awaits with trepidation what will come. Noora remembers one recent Whatsapp audio message in particular, left by her grandmother:

“She started crying as she wished all of us happy Ramadan. She just broke down and started sobbing. She was saying I hope I can see you one day, that we can be together one day and see each other in person. That seemed quite impossible.”

▲ Villagers at Fadhiliya search for survivors, atfer a likely Coalition airstrike near Mosul on October 22nd 2016 killed eight members of one family (Picture courtesy of Fazel Hawramy)

Coalition majorly undercounting civilians killed by its strikes, says Amnesty

Published

October 26, 2016

Written by

Samuel Oakford

Web link

The US-led Coalition targeting so-called Islamic State has substantially underestimated the civilian toll of its airstrikes, according to analysis released by Amnesty International. The detailed report alleges that certain attacks may have violated international humanitarian law.

According to senior Amnesty Syria researcher Neil Sammonds, who authored the study, “the US military’s civilian casualty assessment system is clearly pretty close to being unfit for purpose at present, and needs an overhaul.”

Sammonds and his colleagues focused on just 11 incidents – all in Syria – and identified what they says is “compelling evidence” that 300 civilians were likely killed in reported Coalition airstrikes. The detailed case studies were submitted in late September to the Department of Defense, which has yet to officially respond. The alliance itself has admitted to just one non-combatant fatality from the events.

‘Residential neighbourhood’

Amnesty’s six-month investigation – which draws on open source data, satellite imagery, personal accounts, and existing monitoring by groups including the Syrian Network for Human Rights and Airwars – is one of the most extensive reviews of civilian casualties tied to the Coalition.

The first strike investigated took place over two years ago, at Kafr Daryan in Idlib governorate on September 23rd 2014 – the opening night of Coalition bombings in Syria. That attack was also the first that Syrian monitoring groups were able to review. Accounts compiled by several, including the Violations Documentation Center and the Syrian Network for Human Rights arrived at a toll of at least 13 civilians killed, including five women and five children.

Amnesty’s own assessment says photographic and video evidence for Kafr Daryan indicates a residential area was indeed hit: “The strike location appears to be in a residential neighbourhood, approximately 100m from a mosque, as confirmed by satellite imagery from 30 September 2014 (one week after the attack) obtained by Amnesty International. Several buildings intact in satellite imagery from August 2014 are either completely or partially destroyed in the imagery from 30 September.”

Though US Central Command (CENTCOM) has confirmed cruise missile strikes in the vicinity that night, it continues to insist that it is not in possession of “credible operational reporting through operational channels that would sustain those allegations.”

Amnesty is now calling for the Kafr Daryan case to be re-opened, noting that “At the very least, the presence of large numbers of civilians in the vicinity and the recorded civilian casualties and damage suggest that necessary precautions to minimize harm to civilians may not have been taken.”

Bodies removed from the rubble at Kafr Daryan, September 23rd 2014

Deadliest incident

CENTCOM’s response to Kafr Daryan in September 2014 helped set the tone for the US-led campaign in Syria – even as monitoring groups tallied an ever-growing list of civilian victims from Coalition bombings.

To date, the US has admitted to just 19 civilian deaths in Syria resulting from 12 investigations. By comparison, the best estimate of researchers at Airwars presently puts the Coalition toll in Syria alone at 899 civilians killed. Airwars has been informed by CENTCOM that the release of a further batch of confirmed civilian casualty cases is “pending,” though no firm timetable has been given.

The bloodiest attack reviewed by Amnesty took place in al Tukhar in Syria’s Aleppo province on July 19th 2016, during operations to retake the nearby strategic town of Manbij. At least 73 civilians were likely killed, among them 27 children. Some monitoring groups have put the civilian toll at above 100, and possibly even 200. Airwars currently lists the names of 78 reported victims – and the incident is likely the deadliest so far tied to the Coalition in more than two years of war.

While noting that Islamic State forces were reportedly present in the village, Amnesty has informed CENTCOM that “The attacks appear to have been conducted without adequate precautions taken to safeguard civilians and may have amounted to indiscriminate or disproportionate attacks.”

Shortly after the incident in al Tukhar, CENTCOM – which oversees Coalition operations in both Iraq and Syria – announced it was investigating the bombings. It has yet to release its findings.

Amnesty satellite analysis of the site of another Coalition airstrike at al Ghandoura in July 2016, which likely killed 28 or more civilians (© DigitalGlobe/Google Earth. Graphic produced by Amnesty International)

Reviewing another air raid on the village of Ayn al-Khan in al-Hasakah governote on December 7th 2015, Amnesty suggests the Coalition may have operated based on faulty intelligence, and then failed to acknowledge its failure after some 40 civilians were killed. Airwars prsently lists 24 separate sources for the incident.

“The attack appears to have been indiscriminate and may have resulted from a misidentification of a military objective,” Amnesty notes in its assessment of Ayn al-Khan. “Even if a military objective was present in the vicinity, the heavy loss of civilian life suggests a failure to take necessary precautions or a decision to proceed with an attack which was foreseeably disproportionate.”

Implications for Mosul

Amnesty’s investigation comes as tens of thousands of Iraqi and peshmerga forces attempt to retake ISIL’s de facto Iraqi capital of Mosul, buttressed by heavy air support from the Coalition.

“Failure to see the great harm it causes to civilians throws the Coalition’s Mosul campaign in particular into sharp relief,” says Amnesty’s study author Neil Sammonds. “If 250 civilians were killed in strikes on the Manbij area, how many times more might be expected to die for Mosul?”

This week, spokesperson Col John Dorrian tweeted that the Coalition had unleashed “an all time high” number of strikes between the start of the Mosul offensive on October 17th and October 22nd. “Over 1,400 munitions delivered on #Daesh,” he wrote.

.@CJTFOIR ramped up strikes supporting ISF & Pesh advances on #Mosul to an all time high–over 1400 munitions delivered on #Daesh 17-22 Oct

— OIR Spokesperson (@OIRSpox) October 23, 2016

Though fighting has not yet reached built-up areas of the city, several alleged airstrkes tied to the Coalition have already claimed the lives of more than a dozen civilians according to Airwars tracking. On Monday, local reports indicated a father and his seven children were killed in a village just north of Mosul.

Prise de bec entre la Russie et la Belgique montre la complexité toujours plus grande du conflit syrien

Published

October 20, 2016

Written by

Samuel Oakford

Web link

Research by Eline Westra et Kinda Haddad

La Russie a laissé entendre qu’un membre clé de la Coalition menée par les États-Unis aurait tué six civils dans les zones rurales de la province d’Alep le 17 octobre – une accusation que le ministre de la défense belge a démenti furieusement, criant à la “désinformation russe”.

La prise de bec arrive à un moment où une pause déclarée par Moscou semblait d’être respectée dans la ville d’Alep elle-même – avec la suspension des frappes aériennes du régime russe ainsi que syrien, après des semaines de bombardements féroces.

Selon le ministère de la défense russe, l’incident aurait eu lieu dans le village de Hassajek. Il avait été référencé dans un bulletin quotidien qui en principe met l’accent sur «la réconciliation des côtés opposés de la République arabe syrienne».

La controverse suscitée par cet incident dévoile à quel point il est difficile de monitorer les frappes aériennes en Irak et en Syrie, et en particulier dans les régions d’Alep où de nombreux groupes pourraient théoriquement être responsables.

Dans l’interprétation russe des évènements, « le village d’Hassajek a subi une frappe aérienne le 18 octobre à 3 heures du matin. Deux maisons ont été détruites, six personnes ont été tuées et quatre autres ont été blessées. Les forces aériennes russes et syriennes n’étaient pas présentes dans cette zone ».

La Russie semble d’accuser la Belgique, l’un des plus petits membres de la Coalition menée par les États-Unis : Les avions de la coalition internationale effectuaient des missions près du village de Hassajek la nuit sur Octobre 18. Des systèmes de contrôle ont détecté deux F-16 des Forces aériennes du Royaume de Belgique dans la zone au moment indiqué.

Le gouvernement belge a réagi avec fureur à les allégations. Dans un tweet, le ministre de la défense belge Steven Vandeput a crié à « la désinformation russe ». Laurence Mortier, porte-parole du ministre de la Défense, a démenti que la force aérienne belge ait été impliqué. «Nous n’avons pas effectué des vols dans la zone hier, ni pendant les jours avant », a raconté Mortier à Airwars.

België niet betrokken bij burgerdoden Aleppo. Russische desinformatie.

— Steven Vandeput (@svandeput) October 19, 2016

Le démenti belge des allégations est compliqué par les mauvais résultats de la Belgique du point de vue transparence : le pays est l’un des moins transparents des 13 membres de la Coalition. Au cours des deux dernières années, la Belgique n’a publié ni les dates, ni les lieux de l’une de ses frappes aériennes en Irak ou en Syrie. Les informations de cette semaine ont seulement été dévoilées dans le contexte de « l’accusation par la Russie », a dit Laurence Mortier.

L’absence quasi totale de transparence de la Belgique sur ses activités pour la Coalition a entravé les tentatives d’évaluer si ses bombes ont causé des potentielles victimes civiles – et, dans le même temps, il est difficile d’exonérer le pays de toute responsabilité quand des allégations de victimes civiles surviennent.

Confusion dans les zones de conflit

Il est également possible que les revendications de la Russie aient été malhonnêtes. Les rapports locaux ne sont pas clairs quant à savoir si les victimes signalées dans le village de Hassajek étaient des combattants ou des civils. Dans les batailles qui ont récemment eu lieu dans la zone, différents groupes étaient impliqués, comme Daesh, des rebelles soutenus par la Turquie, et des forces kurdes.

La Turquie, bien qu’officiellement membre de la coalition anti-Daesh, effectue actuellement des frappes aériennes unilatérales en faveur des rebelles dans les zones rurales d’Alep – y compris une faction luttant autour de Hassajek.

Le 20 Octobre, l’Agence de presse étatique de la Turquie a signalé que les avions turcs ont mené des frappes sur 18 milices kurdes durant la nuit, dans une zone située au nord d’Alep et près de l’incident de mardi. Des rapports turcs ont indiqué que près de 200 personnes ont été tuées. Il n’est pas clair si toutes les personnes tuées étaient des membres de groupes armés.

Pendant ce temps, les frappes aériennes de la Coalition ont également continué dans la région – ainsi que celles de la Russie et du régime d’Assad.

Outre le démenti de la Belgique, un porte-parole de la Coalition a raconté à Airwars que « contrairement à ce que les médias russes ont signalé, il n’y a aucune preuve de cet incident et les avions belges n’ont pas mené des kinetic operations à ce moment-là ». Selon les rapports officiels de frappes aériennes couvrant la période du 17 au 19 octobre, la Coalition a mené au moins cinq frappes « près de » Mara’a – une ville dans le nord du gouvernorat d’Alep.

Airwars a suivi un certain nombre d’autres potentiels cas de victimes civiles causées par des frappes aériennes dans la région récemment – mais ces rapports sont souvent assombris par l’incertitude.

Une «pause humanitaire» annoncée le 18 octobre par la Russie pour la partie orientale d’Alep – pour laquelle le pays a voulu montrer son innocence avec l’incident de Hassajek – a en réalité seulement commencée après l’incident. Au cours des derniers mois, les forces aériennes syriennes ainsi que russes ont été responsables de la mort de centaines de civiles à Alep et dans ses environs.

L’allégation d’Hassajek n’est pas la première fois que le régime d’Assad et ses alliés ont cherché à impliquer les forces de la Coalition. En juillet, le gouvernement syrien a cité la France comme étant responsable de frappes aériennes près de Manbij, à Alep, tuant au moins 73 civils. La France n’a pas déclaré de frappes dans ces zones.

▲ A Royal Belgian Air Force F-16 Fighting Falcon receives fuel from a KC-135 Stratotanker over Iraq, Oct. 6, 2016. Airmen from the 340th Expeditionary Air Refueling Squadron refueled U.S. Air Force F-15E Strike Eagles and Royal Belgian Air Force F-16 Fighting Falcons over Iraq in support of Combined Joint Task Force-Operation Inherent Resolve. The U.S. and more than 60 coalition partners work together to eliminate Daesh and the threat they pose to Iraq and Syria. (U.S. Air Force photo/Tech. Sgt. Larry E. Reid Jr., Released)

Russian spat with Belgium over civilian deaths highlights chaos of Syrian skies

Published

October 20, 2016

Written by

Samuel Oakford

Web link

Research by Eline Westra and Kinda Haddad

Russia has implied that a member of the US-led Coalition killed six civilians in rural Aleppo province on October 17th – a claim which drew a furious rebuttal from Belgium’s defence minister, who complained of “Russian disinformation.”

The spat comes as a Moscow-declared pause appeared to be respected in Aleppo city itself – with both Russian and Assad regime airstrikes on hold after weeks of ferocious bombardment.

The alleged incident took place in the village of Hassajek according to Russia’s Defence Ministry, which referenced it in in a daily bulletin nominally focused on ‘the reconciliation of opposing sides in the Syrian Arab Republic.’

The controversy that followed shows just how difficult it is to monitor airstrikes in both Iraq and Syria, and in particular in parts of Aleppo where numerous states could theoretically be responsible.

Read this report in French

In Moscow’s version of events, “Hassajek village suffered an air strike at 3am on October 18th. Two living houses have been destroyed, 6 people were killed and 4 ones were injured. Aircraft of the Russian Aerospace Forces and Syrian Air Force did not operate in this region.”

Instead Russia appeared to blame Belgium, one of the smaller partners in the US-led alliance: “Aircraft of the international coalition were performing tasks near Hassajek village at night on October 18. Air situation control systems have detected two F-16 of the Air Force of the Kingdom of Belgium at the specified time and area.”

The Belgian government reacted furiously to the claim. In a tweet, Belgium’s Minister of Defence Steven Vandeput called the allegations “Russian disinformation.” Laurence Mortier, spokeswoman of the Defence Ministry, denied the country’s air force was involved. “We did not fly there yesterday, nor the days before,’ Mortier told Airwars.

België niet betrokken bij burgerdoden Aleppo. Russische desinformatie.

— Steven Vandeput (@svandeput) October 19, 2016

Belgium’s defence minister complains of ‘Russian disinformation’

The Belgian rebuttal is complicated by the country’s status as one of the least transparent member of the 13-member Coalition. Over the past two years Belgium has refused to provide the dates and locations of its strikes in Iraq or Syria, and Mortier said it only released information this week considering the “accusation by Russia.”

Belgium’s near total lack of transparency over its Coalition activities has stymied attempts to assess what if any civilian toll its bombs have caused – and, conversely, makes it difficult to exonerate the country when it is linked to civilian casualty allegations.

Confused battlespace

Russia’s claims may also have been disingenuous. Local reports were unclear as to whether the reported casualties in Hassajek village were fighters or civilians. The area has recently seen battles involving ISIL, Turkish-backed rebels, and Kurdish forces.

Turkey, while officially a member of the anti-ISIL Coalition, is presently conducting unilateral airstrikes in support of rebels in rural Aleppo – including a faction which has been fighting ISIL around Hassajek.

Confusing matters further, Turkey is also targeting Kurdish factions which are allied with the Coalition. On October 20th, Turkey’s state run news agency reported that Ankara’s jets hit as many as 18 Kurdish militia targets the night before in an area north of Aleppo close to Tuesday’s incident. Turkish reports indicated that as many as 200 people were killed. It was unclear if all those killed were members of armed groups.

Meanwhile Coalition strikes have also continued in the northern Aleppo area – as have air attacks by Russia and the Assad regime.

In addition to Belgium’s denials, a spokesperson for the Coalition told Airwars that “contrary to what Russian media reported, there is no evidence of this incident nor were any Belgian aircraft conducting kinetic operations at the time.” According to official strike reports covering October 17th through 19th, the Coalition launched at least five strikes “near” Mara’a – a town in northern Aleppo governorate.

Airwars has monitored a number of other claimed civilian fatalities from airstrikes in the area recently – but these reports are often clouded in uncertainty.

A ‘humanitarian pause’ announced by Russia in rebel-held eastern Aleppo city October 18th – which it offered as evidence of its own innocence in the Hassajek affair – did not in fact begin until after the incident. Both the Syrian and Russian air forces have been responsible for hundreds of civilian deaths in Aleppo and surrounding areas over the last few months.

The Hassajek accusation is not the first time the Assad regime and its allies have sought to implicate the Coalition. In July, the Syrian government singled out France as being responsible for Coalition strikes near Manbij in Aleppo that left at least 73 civilians dead. France itself declared no strikes in the vicinity.

A year of Russian airstrikes leaves thousands dead

Published

September 29, 2016

Written by

Samuel Oakford

Web link

Russia is marking the first year of a bombing campaign in Syria with some of its deadliest strikes yet, leaving hundreds of civilian casualties in just the past week in besieged Eastern Aleppo – and effectively scuttling diplomatic efforts to pause the war.

According to local monitors more than 3,000 civilians have so far been killed by Russia in its campaign in support of the Assad regime. A new Airwars assessment published this week shows that in January 2016 alone, Russia likely killed more than 700 civilians in Syria.

The severity of the Russian campaign over the past year has varied, reaching a previous high in January and February before falling off for several months, according to Airwars tracking. The latest strikes in Aleppo are heavily concentrated. Yet the huge civilian toll follows a pattern which has characterized Russia’s campaign since it first intervened on September 30th 2015. Implausibly, Russia has not admitted to killing a single Syrian civilian since then.

Researchers at Airwars have assessed extensive open source evidence to determine that in just the first four months of bombing, 291 separate attacks involving Russian forces left between 1,783 and 2,394 noncombatants dead and more than 2,722 injured.

Russian heavy bombers target ‘terrorist facilities in Syria’, August 2016

In total, Airwars has tracked more than 1,300 civilian casualty events allegedly involving Russian forces. Those claims list over 7,000 potential civilian fatalities to date – a figure which will be reduced as researchers vet each incident to determine if possible who was responsible, and whether initially reported casualty numbers were accurate.

The already-vetted data tells us much about the ferocity of Russia’s campaign. The minimum civilian toll from Russian strikes between September 30th and January 31st – 1,783 deaths – is already higher than the 1,612 civilian that researchers at Airwars estimate have been killed by US-led Coalition strikes in both Iraq and Syria in the two years since it began a separate campaign targeting ISIL. In other words, Russia has killed more civilians than the Coalition, in one sixth of the time.

Though the US has carried out investigations into civilian casualties, it has admitted to just 55 civilian deaths in Syria and Iraq – a miniscule number that sets a dangerous precedent for accountability. Those low Coalition casualty claims also weaken any moral pressure the US and its allies might hope to bring on Russia and Assad – even as Aleppo burns.

In a report published this March, Airwars said its database of incidents “indicates that Russia has systematically targeted civilian neighbourhoods and civilian infrastructure – including water plants, wells, marketplaces, bakeries, food depots and aid convoys.” That pattern has continued.

Just last week, suspected Russian planes were involved in an attack on a UN-coordinated aid convoy in the countryside of Aleppo. Eighteen of 31 trucks were destroyed and at least 20 people killed. According to the UN’s child welfare agency UNICEF, nearly 100 children have been killed since last Friday alone in Aleppo. Monitoring groups say Russia has carried out most attacks in the city since the breakdown of a tentative ceasefire.

“There is no doubt that the Russians are deliberately targeting civilians,” says Fadel Abdul Ghany, head of the Syrian Network For Human Rights, one of the groups whose reporting Airwars draws from and evaluates. Ghany says he presented details of Moscow’s strikes to Russian diplomats in New York late last year. “They denied everything,” he now recalls of the encounter.

Naming the dead

Though often unidentified in the media outside of high profile attacks, victims of alleged Russian strikes have in fact been consistently named by local monitoring organizations. In those first four months of Russian bombing between September 30th and January 31st, Airwars has so far been able to list the names of 2,104 civilians allegedly killed by Moscow’s strikes – or three in four of those reported slain.

Among these are at least eight civilians named by the Violations Documentation Center as being killed by Russian airstrikes on January 9th 2016, in Aleppo’s Al Ameria and Al Sukkari neighbourhoods. Most were elderly men in their seventies and eighties. VDC has named Shaker Hweidi (aged 70); Omar Hweidi (84); Abdulaziz Hweidi (82); Kamel Sultan (81); Mohammad Sultan (82); Nader Sultan (aged 30); and a young boy from the Sultan Family.

The White Helmets at the scene of an airstrike on Al Sukkari, Aleppo on January 9th 2016 which killed eight civilians – including five elderly men (via White Helmets)

According to Google archiving, there are now more videod minutes of the Syria conflict than minutes of the war itself. Events that used to exist in a fog of war are now posted online almost instantaneously. Though Russia denies killing civilians, thousands upon thousands of videos on Youtube, Twitter and Facebook show otherwise.

Though the exact perpetrator of these killings cannot always be proven beyond a reasonable doubt, the only question in most cases is whether they fell victim to Russia’s bombs or to those of the Assad regime.

“From 2011 it was clear that the regime’s forces were carrying out crimes against humanity, and subsequently from 2012 war crimes in going after the civilian population,” says Neil Sammonds, Syria researcher at Amnesty International. “Russia followed suit almost immediately when it came to the regime’s rescue one year ago.”

Within months, Amnesty had determined Russia was deliberately targeting civilians. By this April says Sammonds, Russia “was appearing to be actively targeting the essential facilities that a civilian population needs in order to survive, thereby intending to forcibly displace civilians and not allow them access to IDP camps and medical care on the road.” Hospitals in particular have been targeted.

Russian strikes, adds Sammonds, tend to be more powerful than those of the regime. In addition to their use of cluster munitions and incendiary weapons, recent reports indicate that in Aleppo, Russia has now employed powerful “bunker buster” bombs that can penetrate further and leave a vast and deep blast radius.

Aftermath of a likely Russian airstrike on a mosque in Qadi A’skar, Aleppo governorate, January 12th (via White Helmets) One month: 713 civilians killed

Airwars has now released comprehensive data for January 2016, which adds significantly to existing totals. Its provisional view is that between 713 and 974 non combatants died during January alone, making it the deadliest month of Russian strikes to date. Among those victims were a minimum of 198 children, representing a 157 percent increase over child deaths in December. Reported deaths of women also more than doubled to at least 105. Attacks were particularly bloody in the final week of January in both Aleppo and the Islamic State-besieged city of Deir ez-Zor.

Among the detailed strike reports released this week by Airwars is an account of bombings most likely carried out by Russian warplanes in Fayloun, Idlib governorate on January 16th. According to local sources, at least eight children and three women – all members of the al-Saeed family – were killed. The Violations Documentation Center named four of the dead girls as Abeer; Tasneem; Hiba; and Alyaa. Four boys were were also named: Abdulqader; Mohammad; Ahmad; and Abdulrazzaq. The three women were named Seham, Defaf and Hanifah. Footage posted to Youtube shortly afterwards showed rescuers picking up body parts.

Another strike analysed by Airwars occured on January 27th in Al Houla, Homs governorate. According to local sources, six civilians, including a woman, a boy and a girl were killed in Russian strikes. Video posted online by the Homs Media Center showed medics tending to wounded civilians, including children, as relatives cry out in anguish. Suffering like this occurs every day across Syria.

Airwars is currently combing through more than 800 more alleged Russian civilian casualty events reported since January 31st.

The United Nations stopped tracking deaths in Syria over years ago, when it last presented a figure of 250,000. Monitors have put the toll at double that, and earlier this year the UN’s Special Envoy for Syria Staffan de Mistura told reporters he believed the number of overall deaths stood at 400,000.

Yet at the UN’s Security Council, both Russia and China have blocked attempts to refer the situation in Syria to the International Criminal Court – a step which would allow the court to open a preliminary inquiry.

UN Security Council meeting on Syria, December 18th 2015 (US State Department)

A commission of inquiry established by the UN Human Human Rights Council in 2011 continues its work today, but has not broached the question of civilian casualties from foreign airstrikes in a meaningful way. Following remarks last year by its chairman, there was confusion as to whether the commission even viewed its mandate as encompassing strikes carried out by foreign powers in Syria.

More recently, commission staffers have told Airwars they are now making a greater effort – but remain limited both by a lack of resources and by access issues. Unlike UN efforts to track civilian casualties in countries like Afghanistan or Yemen, the independent Commission of Inquiry is unable to send investigators to bombing sites in Syria. The torrent of civilian and local casualty reporting is often deemed unusable by the Commission, which must abide by strict evidentiary guidelines. In its most recent report dated August 11th 2016, the commission did not even mention that Russian strikes have killed civilians.

Amidst a climate of total impunity in Syria, there is currently no credible official accounting of civilian deaths from the airstrikes of foreign powers in Syria. Neither the UN nor the foreign powers that are bombing Syria – predominantly Russia and the United States – have fulfilled their own obligations in this area.

This continued failure makes local reporting efforts and tracking by monitors indispensable. Without them, the many thousands of civilian victims of foreign airstrikes in Syria could be lost to history.

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