Geolocation
Airwars assessment
In the Amnesty and Airwars’s joint April 2019 report “War in Raqqa: Rhetoric versus Reality”, three civilians were reportedly killed in alleged Coalition artillery strike in Raqqa. Although Airwars assesses single sourced incidents as “weak”, researchers have assessed this incident “fair” due to the depth of material provided by Amnesty.
The report stated that “Mohammed Haj Ibrahim, 34, was killed at his home with two of his children by an artillery shell which struck the house while he and his family were sleeping at 4.30 am.”
Hi wife, Hamida, who survived the strike told Amnesty that, “27 days earlier we had tried to escape Raqqa but Daesh shot at us and killed both my husband’s parents. Then the Coalition killed my husband in his sleep. There was no justice in this war.”
The field notes added that they had tried to escape in the night time, and they were shot at by ISIS near “Rashid Park”. Mohammed and his wife Hamida were also injured in this attack.
In July 2019 the Coalition announced that it had assessed this allegation of civilian harm to be non-credible. Their monthly civilian harm report noted: “After a review of available information it was assessed that no Coalition actions were conducted in the geographical area that corresponds to the report of civilian casualties.”
The incident occured at 04:30:00 local time.
The victims were named as:
Family members (3)
Summary
Sources (1) [ collapse]
Attached to this civilian harm incident is a provisional reconciliation of the Pentagon's declassified assessment of this civilian harm allegation, based on matching date and locational information.
The declassified documents were obtained by Azmat Khan and the New York Times through Freedom of Information requests and lawsuits filed since March 2017, and are included alongside the corresponding press release published by the Pentagon. Airwars is currently analysing the contents of each file, and will update our own assessments accordingly.
US-led Coalition Assessment:
Civilian casualty statements
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Aug. 3, 2017, in Raqqa, Syria, via Amnesty International report. After a review of available information it was assessed that no Coalition actions were conducted in the geographical area that corresponds to the report of civilian casualties.
Original strike reports
Near Raqqah, 11 strikes engaged seven ISIS tactical units and destroyed six fighting
positions, a mortar system, a vehicle, a VBIED and a supply route.