In the Amnesty and Airwars’s joint April 2019 report “War in Raqqa: Rhetoric versus Reality”, five civilians were reportedly killed in an alleged Coalition airstrike in Raqqa. Although Amnesty researched this incident on the ground, Airwars have decided to grade it “weak” due to the depth of material provided.

The victims were not specifically named by Amnesty however there was an incident which occurred on the 14th in the same location whereby named members of the Al Haj family were killed. We do know however that these were separate strikes as the other incident contains names and a survivor testimony. See incident CS983 for more details.

The Amnesty/Airwars repor stated that “Five members of the Al-Haj family – the parents and their three children aged ten, eight and two – where killed by a coalition airstrike which destroyed the building they were sheltering in.”

In addition to this, “Hoda”, sister of a victim told Amnesty that “My brother and his family lived on the upper floor of a tall building nearby but moved to this lower building for protection from air strikes. During the war we all tried to avoid upper floors for that reason.”