Incident date
May 28, 2023
LOCATION
عفرين ، رأس العين ، اعزاز ، تل أبيض ، الباب ، جرابلس, Afrin, Ras Al Ain, Azaz, Tell Abyad, Al Bab, Jarablus, Aleppo, SyriaA child was killed and between 20 to 25 civilians, including two women and four children, were injured by alleged Turkish-back faction heavy gunfire around Afrin on May 28, 2023. Hawar News initially reported that a child was killed and “a number of people, including women” were injured by gunfire from Turkish militia members while
Summary
Incident date
May 24, 2023
LOCATION
between the towns of Kansafra and Al-Fatira, Idlib, SyriaA young man was reportedly injured by shrapnel from machine guns attributed to both Russian forces and the Syrian regime on May 24th 2023. The incident occured on agricultural land between the town of Kansafra and Al-Fatirah, in the southern countryside of Idlib. Reports from the Syrian Civil Defence, Halab Today TV and Twitter user
Summary
Incident date
May 18, 2023
LOCATION
الخاروفية, Al Kharofiya, Aleppo, SyriaAn elderly man was killed by alleged Turkish drone strikes on Al-Kharofiya village on May 18, 2023. A local source told a North Press Agency correspondent that a civilian was killed when a vehicle close to him on the road was struck by a drone. The source also provided the name of the civilian killed:
Summary
Incident date
May 17, 2023
LOCATION
جديدة, Jadeda, Raqqa, SyriaThree civilians, including at least one child, were injured by alleged Turkish shelling of Jadeda village on May 17, 2023. Rohani TV reported that Turkish forces bombarded Jadeda village, resulting in the injury of three civilians: Muhammad Fawaz Al-Waqqa, his brother Mahmoud Fawaz Al-Waqqa, and Muhammad Salem Kamal. The director of the National Hospital in
Summary
Incident date
May 17, 2023
LOCATION
مخيم عين عيسى, Ain Issa camp, Raqqa, SyriaTwo civilians were injured by alleged Turkish shelling of Ain Issa camp on May 17, 2023. Hawar News reported that during the second incident in Ain Issa district on May 17th, two civilians were injured when Turkish forces bombarded Ain Issa camp. Correspondents for Hawar added that the shelling caused an outbreak of fire in
Summary
Incident date
May 15, 2023
LOCATION
كفرعويد, Kafr Aweed, Idlib, SyriaOne man, identified by sources as Suleiman Muhammad al-Saleem, was killed on May 15th 2023 after artillery shelling attributed to both the Syrian regime and Russian forces hit the village of Kafr Aweed in the southern countryside of Idlib according to local media outlets and the Syrian Civil Defence. Initial reports from the Syrian Civil
Summary
Incident date
May 11, 2023
LOCATION
تل اللبن, Tel Al Laban, Al Hassakah, SyriaOne civilian was killed and four other civilians were injured by alleged Turkish shelling of the village of Tal Al Laban around 10am on May 11, 2023. Hawar News reported that a civilian was killed and four others were wounded when Turkish forces bombarded the village of Tal Al Laban. Hawar also published the names
Summary
Incident date
May 8, 2023
LOCATION
قرية الشعاب, Al Shi’ab village, Al Suwayda, SyriaThe Jordanian military is suspected of conducting an airstrike that killed a family of eight, including up to six children and a woman, in Al-Shiab, a village near the Syrian/Jordanian border on May 8, 2023. Daraa 24 and other local sources reported that the victims were suspected drug smuggler Marai al-Ramthan, his wife Hind al-Ramthan,
Summary
Incident date
May 3, 2023
LOCATION
بحيره, Bahira, Al Hassakah, SyriaA 49 year old man was allegedly shot and injured by Turkish border guards in the village of Bahira on May 3, 2023. Hawar News reported that a civilian was wounded by live bullets fired by the Turkish army. A relative of the injured civilian told a Hawar reporter that live bullets fired between 14:00
Summary
Incident date
May 3, 2023
LOCATION
قورقانيا, Qurqaniya, Idlib, SyriaA 60 year old male civilian was killed by a declared US drone strike on the outskirts of Qurqaniya just before noon on May 3, 2023. At the time of the strike, US Central Command released a statement that they had targeted a senior Al Qaeda leader without any additional details. On May 2, 2024,
Summary
Incident date
May 1, 2023
LOCATION
حلب, al-Nayrab, Aleppo, SyriaOn May 1st 2023, at around 11:35 pm, Israel allegedly conducted airstrikes southeast of Aleppo near al-Nayrab, reportedly injuring up to seven people, and killing between one to seven others. Two civilians were among those injured. There were discrepancies amongst the casualty reports on how many of the affected were civilians as opposed to people
Summary
Incident date
April 29, 2023
LOCATION
حمص, Homs, SyriaOn April 29th 2023 the Israeli military reportedly launched missiles which Syrian air defence systems reportedly shot down around 12:55 am in the city of Homs, Syria. There were discrepancies in the accounts of the incident, with some sources reported that three civilians were injured while other reported that four Syrian soldiers were injured. Local
Summary
Incident date
April 25, 2023
LOCATION
معربليت, Ma’arablit, Idlib, SyriaA young woman was killed and four other civilians, including two children and a woman, were injured by alleged Syrian regime and/or Russian artillery shelling of Ma’arablit on April 25, 2023. Afrin Post reported that Noura Abdul Hamid Al-Ahmad, twenty years old, was killed by artillery strikes in Ma’arablit, and her family members, the infant Lyan
Summary
Incident date
April 24, 2023
LOCATION
عين العبد, Ain Al Abd, Al Hassakah, SyriaTwo young girls and a boy were killed and two other children were injured, all of which were from the same family, by alleged Turkish shelling of the village of Ain al-Abd on April 24, 2023. Hawar News reported that two young sisters were killed and two young brothers and a sister were injured by
Summary
Incident date
April 16, 2023
LOCATION
الأبزمو, Al Abzimo, Aleppo, SyriaAround midnight on April 16-17th artillery fire wounded five civilians in Al-Abizmo, a town west of Aleppo. The victims consisted of a woman and her four children. Local news agencies were conflicted as to whether the strike confirmed the strike was conducted by the Syrian regime, Russian forces or Iranian militias. A few of the
Summary
Incident date
April 9, 2023
LOCATION
سرمين, Sarmin, Idlib, SyriaOn April 9th, 2023, in the town off Sarmin, east of Idlib, multiple sources allege artillery fire from Syrian and/or Russian forces killed 15 year old boy Ibrahim Musab Al Haj Musa and injured between three to four others, including a six year old child named Malak Khalaf, a three year old named Abdul Salam
Summary
Tribunal follows Ministry of Defence and Information Commissioner's refusal to release details of incident
Airwars is to challenge the Ministry of Defence and the Information Commissioner at a tribunal over the refusal to release basic information about the sole civilian the UK accepts killing in the war against the Islamic State, it announced on Wednesday.
During the eight years of the UK’s contribution to the Anti-ISIS Coalition in Iraq and Syria, British aircrafts dropped more than 4,300 munitions, and the Ministry of Defence claims to have killed more than 4,000 ISIS militants. Yet the strike on March 26, 2018 remains the only time the UK government has officially accepted harming civilians.
Incident date
April 4, 2023
LOCATION
الكسوة, Al Kisswa, Damascus, SyriaOn April 4th, 2023 at 12:15am, an airstrike either launched by Israeli forces or an air defense missile launched by the Syrian regime hit a glass factory in Al-Kisswa, south of Damascus, in Rif Dimashq, resulting in the death of up to two civilians. Syrian Arab News Agency (SANA), a Syrian regime-controlled news source, reported
Summary
Airwars investigation with The Guardian reveals major flaws in the Ministry of Defence's narrative
This article was originally published in The Guardian and written by Airwars’ head of investigations Joe Dyke and Emma Graham-Harrison of The Guardian. The original version can be read here.
It sounded like accountability. Pressed about the UK’s implausibly spotless record in its bombing campaign against Islamic State in Syria and Iraq, the British government admitted in May 2018 that its military had killed one civilian in eastern Syria two months earlier.
But the strike the then defence secretary, Gavin Williamson, described to parliament was not logged in the records of civilian casualties kept by its allies in the international coalition flying bombers and drones over Syria and Iraq.
Nor does it appear in a list of UK attacks that killed militants, even though the target was three fighters, an investigation by the Guardian and Airwars, a nonprofit research organisation, has found.
And Syrian human rights groups and journalists, who have collected far more extensive databases of civilian deaths and injuries than foreign militaries, have no record of a civilian death in the area on that day.
So Britain’s only recognised civilian casualty of an eight-year aerial bombing campaign against IS apparently came in a strike that did not officially harm anyone, on a victim who does not appear to officially exist.
The UK government has for years said it fought a “perfect” war against IS in Iraq, killing more than 3,000 militants without harming a single civilian. In Syria, the official record is marred only by the single victim reported to parliament.
This government position has been questioned by top retired military officers and defence officials. The former head of GCHQ and permanent secretary of the Ministry of Defence, David Omand, said it “invites challenge”.
A Guardian investigation has identified six strikes in the Iraqi city of Mosul that killed civilians and appear to have been carried out by British forces.
The discovery of serious contradictions in the government account of the only civilian death accepted by UK authorities adds to concerns about Britain’s ability or willingness to document civilian deaths and injuries caused by its bombing campaign.
The only record of this strike, or of the death the government claims it caused, came on 2 May 2018 in a written statement to the House of Commons.
Britain’s allies had accepted killing hundreds of civilians in the bombing campaign, now nearly four years old, and pressure was growing over Britain’s claim that its war had not harmed a single Iraqi or Syrian civilian.
The previous day, a BBC investigation quoted an anonymous senior member of the coalition, who claimed the UK was ignoring allegations of civilian harm from its airstrikes.
The statement provided several important details. It described a hellfire missile strike aimed at three militants. “A civilian motorbike crossed into the strike area at the last moment and it is assessed that one civilian was unintentionally killed.”
It said the strike was in eastern Syria, a vast area roughly half the size of England that was relatively quiet at the time.
It made clear the strike was carried out as part of the US-led coalition, and said the attack had been referred to the specialist unit for investigation. “As with any serious incident, the wider coalition also conducts its own investigation and will report in due course,” the statement said.
The coalition assessed only one report of a civilian casualty incident in eastern Syria on that day, giving the location as Abu Kamal, an area on the Iraq-Syria border, the last IS holdout at the time.
In summary of their findings, released several months after Williamson’s statement to parliament, investigators ruled out any civilian deaths in a coalition strike in the area.
“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,” investigators for the alliance concluded.
This conclusion was reached, even though coalition standards of proof were more relaxed than British ones.
It operated on a “balance of probabilities” basis to accept deaths and injuries. The UK had not explained how it determined civilian harm but was believed to have a threshold similar to the “beyond reasonable doubt” used in British courts.
There are three acknowledged British strikes across Syria and Iraq that the coalition accepted caused civilian casualties. The UK continues to insist no civilians were harmed in those attacks.
The strike described to parliament in 2018 is the only known case where the UK says a civilian was harmed, and the coalition found the opposite.
Absence of records
The strike is also inexplicably absent from recently released UK records. The British government last year provided Airwars with logs of location and date for all RAF airstrikes that killed militants, in response to a freedom of information request.
The strike on 26 March described in the statement to parliament should have been included, because it hit three fighters as well as the civilian. But the data shows no British strike that killed militants anywhere in Syria on the day in question.
British authorities have always publicly said the RAF conducted strikes only as part of a coalition in Iraq and Syria.
If a British strike killed a civilian on the date and place, and in the way described by Williamson, these records raise questions about whether it was part of the coalition mission – or if the UK was acting alone, about the target, the justification and the legality of the attack.
If details of the strike raise serious questions, so too does the identity of the civilian allegedly killed.
Syria has relatively high levels of internet connectivity and many non-government organisations that systematically recorded the names of those killed in its long civil war, either to ensure a permanent record or in the hope of justice in the future.
Their multiple databases include many more civilian victims than parties to the conflict, including thewestern alliance, accept killing. Yet none of them have any record of a civilian being killed on that day, in eastern Syria, in circumstances that match those described by Williamson.
Six separate Syrian nongovernmental organisations that collate data on civilians killed in the war told the Guardian they had no recorded deaths for that area on 26 March 2018. They included Deir Ezzor 24, which specialises in the region where the incident took place.
Local Facebook groups for towns around Asshafa, often busy with news of casualties, had no record of any civilians killed in that area on that date.
The absence of any record of a death in Syrian records is not in itself absolute proof that no civilian was killed. Despite the best efforts of Syrian and international researchers, some civilian deaths were never recorded.
However, the conflict in this part of Syria was tapering off in early 2018. Airwars recorded six civilian harm allegations in that region that month, compared with hundreds during intense periods of fighting in cities such as Mosul and Raqqa.
That greatly lessened the likelihood of this strike going unnoticed or undocumented by local communities, who had more time and energy, and took fewer risks, collecting evidence on civilian deaths that did happen.
At the very least, the absence of this civilian from any databases is evidence that the UK government did not reach out to Syrians to investigate the death.
The Ministry of Defence declined to comment directly on discrepancies in the UK public record, with coalition public statements or with data from Syrian groups.
“A highly trained and professional team of UK military personnel assessed a civilian fatality had been caused,” a spokesperson said.
“We remain confident in the transparency of our reporting and data published by the department can be considered as authoritative on UK military operations as possible.” Williamson did not respond to requests for comment on his statement.
UK claims ‘invite challenge’
To date, this strike remains the sole occasion the UK has officially accepted harming civilians in nine years of bombing IS in Iraq and Syria.
In that time British aircraft have launched more than 4,300 munitions, and the Ministry of Defence claims to have killed more than 4,000 IS militants – in effect claiming a “perfect” war in Iraq that did not harm a single civilian, and a near-perfect one in Syria, with just one death.
The coalition overall has accepted its strikes killed at least 1,437 civilians, the majority of them in American strikes.
Omand said the UK government’s position on civilian casualties “invites challenge”.
In a question to an Oxford Media Network event, with the former chief of defence staff Gen Sir Nick Carter, Omand said he did not personally have any details about civilian casualties in the fight against IS but suggested the official claim of a ‘perfect war’ in Iraq lacked credibility.
“Why aren’t we much more on the front foot saying our operations are necessary, they are proportionate but they don’t always achieve the results?” he asked Carter, criticising “the defensive crouch, whenever there’s a suspicion that something hasn’t quite worked out”.
Government openness about civilian casualties should bolster confidence in the military’s ability to protect civilians, and ministers’ willingness to be transparent about how Britain wields lethal powers.
Yet questions about the nature, location and impact of the 26 March strike are so fundamental that the government statement only undermines trust and raises more questions than it answers.
Carter, responding to Omand, backed a strategic argument for greater openness. “I very much agree with you (Omand),” he said. “I’ve always believed one is far better off being honest and transparent. Our institutions are the backbone of our democracy. And those institutions need to be able to speak honestly about what is happening. It mustn’t be politicised.”
Yet the Ministry of Defence is fighting a lengthy and expensive legal campaign to avoid releasing further details of the strike, including the location, after a freedom of information request by Airwars.
The MoD has said publishing details could jeopardise national security, relations with friendly countries and put individual staff at risk, even though other members of the coalition are far more transparent.
The Netherlands has paid millions in compensation to victims of its strikes. This week, after journalists found new evidence of civilian casualties from a Dutch attack in Mosul in 2016, it announced a fresh inquiry into the strike, and recently released large amounts of classified information about other strikes on IS targets.
The US has launched significant policy reforms to learn lessons for future wars. American authorities also released 1,300 documents to the New York Times after a freedom of information request. Many offer granular details of strikes including chat logs between drone pilots.
The UK information commissioner acknowledged Airwars’ complaint that the MoD’s approach appears “less transparent” than its US counterpart.
A tribunal hearing this year will decide on the freedom of information request, in effect determining how much the British public has a right to know about civilians killed in their name in the fight against IS.
كشف تحقيق استمر لمدة عام عن مقتل عشرات المدنيين جراء غارات جوية محتملة للمملكة المتحدة
قضت الحروب الجوية و الجارديان العام الماضي في التحقيق في الغارات الجوية البريطانية في العراق وسوريا ، بين عامي 2014 و 2020. ووجدنا أدلة على ما لا يقل عن ست غارات جوية وقعت في الموصل ، يُرجح أنها كانت هجمات بريطانية ، قتلت وألحقت الأذى بالمدنيين في المدينة.
Incident date
March 30, 2023
LOCATION
ترمانين, Termanin, Idlib, SyriaOn the evening of March 30th, 2023, several sources reported alleged Russian and/or Syrian regime artillery shelling near Termanin, north of Idlib resulting in the injury of between one and two civilians. The Syrian Network for Human Rights and other sources report that one civilian was wounded while the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights and
Summary
Incident date
March 24, 2023
LOCATION
الأبزمو, Al Abzimo, Aleppo, SyriaOne civilian, a young man identified by sources as Ayman Mamoun Hijazi, was reportedly killed in the town of Al Abzimo, in the western countryside of Aleppo on March 24th 2023 after a contested attack as a result of Russian forces and/or Syrian regime artillery shelling hit the marketplace after midnight, according to the Syrian
Summary
Year-long investigation identifies dozens of civilians killed in likely UK strikes
A new Airwars and The Guardian investigation has identified dozens of Iraqi and Syrian civilians killed by likely UK airstrikes, as part of a widespread package picking apart the British claim to have fought a near victimless eight-year war.
Since 2014, the UK has dropped more than 4,000 munitions in the war against the so-called Islamic State. It claims that those strikes have killed more than 4,000 ISIS militants, but has only accepted responsibility for the death of one civilian.
Incident date
March 24, 2023
LOCATION
ذيبان, Dhiban, Deir Ezzor, SyriaOn Friday March 24th, at 8:05 am, an Iranian militia allegedly launched rockets at Coalition forces at “Green Village,” an American base near al-Omar oil field east of Deir Ezzor. According to CENTCOM, the rockets missed the Coalition facility by approximately 5 km. Instead, they reportedly hit a house in Dhiban and injured two women
Summary
Incident date
March 23, 2023
LOCATION
الأتارب, Atareb, Aleppo, SyriaUp to one civilian was killed, plus one woman and a man were reportedly injured as a result of contested action by Russian forces or the Syrian regime when a marketplace and a residential neighbourhood was hit by artillery and missile shelling in the city of Atareb, west of Aleppo, Syria. This attack took place