Geolocation
Airwars assessment
Multiple sources blamed the US-led Coalition for the deaths of a woman and her seven children at al Baza’a, north east of al Bab. However the Coalition later assessed the claims as ‘Not credible.’ Given Turkey’sd own campaign at the time at Al-Bab, its aircraft may therefore have been responsible.
According to Step News “Coalition planes launch several raids on al Baza’a last night killing eight people including women and children.” The Syrian Observatory did not identify the perpetrators however, noting that “a woman with seven of her children was killed by massacre by warplanes targeted Bazaa village northeast of al-Bab city.”
Syria News Desk reported the following: “A civilian source from al Bab, on condition of anonymity, told Syria news desk , that the planes targeted the old police station and nearby homes on the southern outskirts of town, confirming the presence of several dangerous situations among the injured, who were transferred to hospitals in Al Bab, making it likely that number of deaths will rise during coming hours due to poor medical facilities in the region.
“The source added that the raids resulted in the destruction of the police station building and two houses completely and burning a house and three civilian cars, in addition to considerable material damage to a number of shops and their contents.”
Euphrates Post – which also blamed the Coalition – named the dead.
In an emailed response to a report submitted by Airwars on this and other incidents in December 2016, Coalition officials said the event was presently assessed as ‘Not credible.’
The local time of the incident is unknown.
The victims were named as:
Family members (7)
Summary
Sources (6) [ collapse]
Geolocation notes
Reports of the incident mention the town of Al Baza’a (البزاعة), for which the generic coordinates are: 36.3829071, 37.56666. Due to limited satellite imagery and information available to Airwars, we were unable to verify the location further.
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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After a review of available information it was assessed that no Coalition strikes were conducted in the geographical area of the reported civilian casualties.
Original strike reports
For December 5th-6th 2016, the Coalition reported that “Near Manbij, one strike engaged an ISIL tactical unit.”
In the last week France has conducted 10 strikes: Eight in Iraq (near Mosul) and two in Syria. Eleven ISIL targets were destroyed.
#Chammal : 10 frappes cette semaine en Irak et en Syrie, 11 objectifs détruits.