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Watchdog: War on Islamic State kills 6,000 civilians in 2017

By Missy Ryan, The Washington Post
Published: January 18, 2018, 9:49pm

U.S. and allied strikes against the Islamic State may have killed as many as 6,000 civilians in 2017, as international forces pushed militants out of strongholds in Iraq and Syria, a watchdog group said Thursday.

“In 2017 the war against ISIS moved into the most densely-populated urban centers controlled by the group, with dire results for civilians,” Airwars said in a new report summarizing its investigations for the year, which it called the “deadliest yet” for Iraqis and Syrians.

ISIS is another name for the Islamic State, the extremist group that drew Western nations into a new Middle Eastern conflict after it captured large swathes of Iraq and Syria in 2014.

Airwars, which investigates civilian casualty allegations using social media and other information, said that between 3,923 and 6,102 noncombatants were “likely killed” in air and artillery strikes by the United States and its partners in 2017.

The estimate for Iraq and Syria was more than triple that of the year before, Airwars said.

While the Airwars data includes strikes by the United States and partner nations including Britain and France, most of the military activity has been conducted by American forces.

The group’s estimate is vastly higher than the figure put forward by U.S. Central Command, which conducts its own investigations of selected U.S. strikes.

According to its most recent public report, CENTCOM has determined that at least 817 civilians have been killed since the air campaign began in 2014. The command continues to investigate other reported incidents.

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