Under the headline "Newspaper: America Concealed the Death of Dozens of Women and Children in Airstrikes in Syria," the Arabic site reported that the American newspaper "The New York Times" stated yesterday, Saturday, that the U.S. military covered up two airstrikes conducted in Syria in 2019 that resulted in the deaths of approximately 64 women and children — a potential war crime — during its battle against ISIS. According to the report, the two successive airstrikes near the village of Baghouz were ordered by a secret American special operations unit tasked with ground operations in Syria.
The newspaper noted that the U.S. Central Command, which oversaw the U.S. air operations in Syria, acknowledged the strikes for the first time in recent days, claiming they were justified. The Central Command reiterated in a statement on Saturday the narrative it provided to the newspaper about 80 people being killed in the strikes, including 16 ISIS fighters and 4 civilians.
The military stated it was unclear if the remaining 60 casualties were civilians, partly because "women and children might have been fighters," according to the military. In a statement on Saturday, the military described the strikes as "a legitimate act of self-defense" and a proportional response, asserting that "appropriate steps were taken to exclude the presence of civilians."
The U.S. Central Command expressed sadness over the loss of innocent lives, stating they took all possible measures to avoid such losses. The command announced that it had disclosed the double strike itself, investigated it based on its own evidence, and took full responsibility for the unintended loss of life.
It was also added that it was not possible to determine the number of civilians among the 60 killed due to "the observation of many armed women and at least one armed child" in a video recording of the incident, suggesting that the majority of the sixty were likely potential fighters.
The command reported that the strikes occurred while Syrian Democratic Forces were under heavy fire and at risk of being overrun, with those forces informing Washington that the area was free of civilians. The U.S. Department of Defense's inspector general opened an investigation into the incident, which took place on March 18, 2019, but the final report "lacked" any mention of the strikes and did not conduct a thorough independent investigation, according to The New York Times.
The newspaper stated that its report was based on classified documents as well as interviews with individuals who were directly involved in the operation. It noted that a lawyer from the Air Force present at the operations center at the time saw signs of war crimes in the incident and reported it to the Defense Department's inspector general and the Senate Armed Services Committee when no action was taken.
