Geolocation
Airwars assessment
Four civilians including a mother and daughter were reported killed in an alleged Coalition morning strike on Raqqa al Samra, east of Raqqa city.
Euphrates Post cited local civilian sources as saying that “Coalition aircraft targeted with highly explosive rockets residential homes in Raqqa al Samra which caused the deaths of four civilians, including a woman and her daughter and seven injured, including three critical cases were transferred to hospitals in the city of Raqqa.” It later reported that Coalition warplanes targeted residential houses with missiles, killing four non-combatants including a woman and her child. The source added that a further seven people were injured, three critically.
The local time of the incident is unknown.
Geolocation notes
Reports of the incident mention the village of Raqqa al Samra (رقة السمرة), for which the generic coordinates are: 35.9327067, 39.0910721. Due to limited satellite imagery and information available to Airwars, we were unable to verify the location further.
Summary
Sources (4) [ 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
-
After a review of available information it was assessed that no Coalition strikes were conducted in the geographical area that correspond to the report of civilian casualties.
Original strike reports
For January 8th-9th, the Coalition reported that “Near Ar Raqqah, 15 strikes [1 British] engaged five ISIL tactical units; destroyed six oil refinement stills, three supply caches, two bridges, two artillery systems, a VBIED, a bulldozer, a UAV, an IED, a dump truck, a pontoon bridge, a tank, and an armored vehicle; and damaged a supply route. Near Ayn Isa, one strike destroyed a repeater station.”