As many as 2,832 Syrian civilians, including 861 children and 617 women, were killed in airstrikes by the international anti-ISIS coalition forces in the period between 23 September 2014 and 23 September 2018, a monitoring group said. It noted that these attacks violated international humanitarian law as they caused heavy civilian casualties.
In a report issued on Sunday marking the fourth anniversary of the start of military operations against the ISIS extremist group, the Syrian Network for Human Rights (SMHR) said that 976 civilians, including 194 children and 294 women, were killed during the presidency of Barack Obama. It pointed out that 1,856 civilians, including 667 children and 323 woman, were killed under President Donald Trump.
The report indicated that airstrikes by the international anti-ISIS coalition forces have caused no fewer than 156 massacres and destroyed around 170 vital civilian centers since the start of the aerial bombing campaign against ISIS in Syria.
The report pointed to marked changes in operations against ISIS in the past two years in terms of the geographical area and scale of civilian casualties. Compared to the first two years, the airstrikes became more indiscriminate in the past two years and saw the use of the internationally prohibited white phosphorus in areas far from the frontlines.
The international anti-ISIS coalition forces earlier admitted that its airstrikes, numbering around 30,000 back then, killed 1,061 civilians in Iraq and Syria.
The Network stressed that these indiscriminate attacks constituted a clear violation of the international humanitarian law, adding that the indiscriminate bombardment amounted to crimes against humanity. It underscored that the international community must take the necessary measures to prevent civilian casualties in the war on ISIS. (Source: Syrian Coalition’s Media Department)
