US and coalition airstrikes killed nearly 1,200 people in Syria

US and coalition airstrikes killed nearly 1,200 people in Syria
Sat Dec 27, 2014 13:07:46

US and coalition airstrikes against the Islamic State in Syria have killed nearly 1,200 people ‒ including 52 civilians ‒ and wounded at least 800 others at a cost of more than $1 billion since the bombings began in September.

The Syrian Observatory for Human Rights (SOHR) said Thursday that airstrikes in Syria over the last three months have killed 1,046 fighters from the Islamic State – most of whom were non-Syrian fighters.

An additional 72 jihadists from Jabhat al-Nusra, a rival group, were killed in bombing raids against their headquarters in the western countryside of Aleppo and the northern countryside of Idlib.

Of the 52 dead civilians, eight were women and five were children. They died during coalition airstrikes on oil fields and refineries in the al-Hasakah and Der-Ezzor countrysides, as well as al-Raqqa, Menbej – located northeast of Aleppo – and the Idlib countryside.

“We, in SOHR, believed that the real number of casualties in ISIS is more than our number, because there is absolute secrecy on casualties and due to the difficulty of access to many areas and villages that have witnessed violent clashes and bombardment,” the group said in a Tuesday statement, expressing “strong condemnation” of the civilian deaths as a result of coalition activities.

 Coalition nations conducting airstrikes in Iraq include the US, Australia, Belgium, Canada, Denmark, France, the Netherlands, and the United Kingdom. Those conducting bombing raids in Syria include the US, Bahrain, Jordan, Saudi Arabia, and the United Arab Emirates.

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