Geolocation
Airwars assessment
The Syrian Observatory for Human Rights reported that “warplanes believed to belong to the International Coalition bombed places in the Kdieran area which is located in the western countryside of al-Raqqa. There is information about casualties and damage to the property of the citizens.”
Both Qasioun and Sohaib_heskayi reported the Coalition “destroyed the Al-Hamdawi mosque” but didn’t mention civilian casualties.
In January 2019, the Coalition announced that it had classed the event as non credible due to a lack of available evidence of civilian harm: “After a review of available information and strike video it was assessed that there is insufficient evidence to find civilians were harmed in this strike.”
The local time of the incident is unknown.
Geolocation notes
Reports of the incident mention the village of Kdeiran (كديران), for which the generic coordinates are: 35.877429, 38.719676. 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
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May 8, 2017, near Kdeiran, Syria via Airwars report. After a review of available information and strike video it was assessed that there is insufficient evidence to find civilians were harmed in this strike.