theintercept--2019-04-25--Coalition Airstrikes in Raqqa Killed at Least 1600 Civilians More Than 10 Times US Tally Report

Coalition Airstrikes in Raqqa Killed at Least 1,600 Civilians, More Than 10 Times U.S. Tally, Report Finds

of September 5, 2017, Mohannad al-Tadfi rushed over to his brother’s six-story apartment building in Raqqa, Syria. Mohannad’s brother, Lattuf, lived on the ground floor with his wife, Samiha, their six children, and his mother, Amina. Other families had fled the city, leaving the building mostly vacant, but Amina was bedridden from diabetes, and medicine was in short supply.  “I had managed to find some insulin for my mother and I rushed over to bring it to her,” Mohannad told researchers from the human rights group Amnesty International. “I was planning to return later that day with my wife and children to wait for the area to be liberated” from the Islamic State, which had made Raqqa the capital of its self-declared caliphate.  But two hours after Mohannad left his mother’s side, an airstrike by the U.S.-led coalition destroyed the apartment building, killing Lattuf’s entire family.  Mohannad al-Tadfi is one of more than 400 witnesses or survivors interviewed by Amnesty International, which, along with the monitoring group Airwars, released their most comprehensive report Thursday on the coalition’s air and artillery campaign during the four-month offensive to retake the city in 2017.  The groups found that coalition strikes killed at least 1,600 civilians. Amnesty researchers in Syria were able to directly verify 641 of those deaths and said there were “very strong, multiple source reports” for the rest. The groups were able to collect the names of more than 1,000 civilians killed.  The findings, published along with an interactive database based on two years of on-the-ground investigations, provide the most methodical estimate to date of the death toll from coalition bombing, even as Pentagon officials continue to downplay the damage of the U.S.-led air campaign.  “I didn’t come to Raqqa with any preconceived ideas of what had or had not happened,” Donatella Rovera, a crisis investigator for Amnesty, said in a video released by the group. “But what I came to discover is that little to no protection was afforded to the thousands of civilians who were trapped in the city.”  ISIS lost control of Raqqa in October 2017, when the city was recaptured by the U.S.-backed Syrian Democratic Forces in what was hailed a key milestone in reclaiming territory once held by the terror group. But four years of ISIS rule and four months of fighting left the city in ruins, with more than 11,000 buildings destroyed. During the fighting, ISIS used booby traps, land mines, and snipers to prevent civilians from fleeing, trapping thousands of people and leaving them vulnerable to what former Defense Secretary James Mattis called “annihilation tactics.”  “The public deserves to know how many civilian casualties our government is responsible for, and the survivors deserve acknowledgement, reparations, where appropriate, and meaningful assistance to rebuild their lives,” said Daphne Eviatar, director of the Security With Human Rights program at Amnesty International USA.  According to a statement from Amnesty, the groups regularly engage with the U.S., U.K., and French militaries about civilian casualties. As a result, the coalition has admitted responsibility for killing 159 civilians in Raqqa, but the U.S. has dismissed most of the allegations as “non-credible.”  In 2017, Gen. Stephen Townsend, then the commander of the task force leading the fight against ISIS, wrote in Foreign Policy that the U.S. conducts thorough assessments, which have shown that less than 1 percent of airstrikes result in “a credible report” of civilian casualties.  “Assertions by Airwars, along with claims by the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights and media outlets that cite them, are often unsupported by fact and serve only to strengthen the Islamic State’s hold on civilians, placing civilians at greater risk,” Townsend wrote.  However, monitoring groups have pointed out that it is extremely rare for U.S. personnel to interview eyewitnesses or victims of airstrikes, and they are only likely to concede civilian casualties that are observable by their own intelligence feeds. As a result, over the course of the U.S. anti-ISIS campaign, Airwars estimates that more than 7,700 civilians have been killed in Iraq and Syria, while as of March, the Pentagon estimated fewer than 1,300 deaths.  “Essentially what I’ve been doing here is the work that the coalition should be doing,” Rovera says in the Amnesty video. “They have been bombarding the city. They should be here looking at the impact that that has had on the civilian population.”


thetelegraph--2019-07-23--More than 50 Syrian civilians killed in Idlib by Russian and Assad regime strikes

More than 50 Syrian civilians killed in Idlib 'by Russian and Assad regime strikes'

Regime and Russian air strikes killed 50 people in northwest Syria on Monday, most of them in a crowded market, a war monitor said, in the latest violence to plague the opposition bastion.  In the town of Maaret al-Numan in Idlib province, men covered in blood were carried away from the market by residents and rescue workers, who used mattresses as makeshift stretchers, an AFP photographer said.  He saw the corpse of one man sprawled on the ground near a motorcycle, rubble surrounding his lifeless body.  With his eyes closed and his face covered in dust, another man clutched the arms of two people helping him out of the bombed area, the photographer added.  The Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said air strikes on the vegetable market and surrounding areas in Maaret al-Numan killed 36 civilians and two unidentified persons.


thetelegraph--2019-10-09--US meth lab strikes in Afghanistan killed at least 30 civilians says UN

An American blitz on dozens of Taliban drug factories in Western Afghanistan killed at least 30 civilians and may have left dozens more dead, a United Nations report has found.  United States aircraft struck more than 60 methamphetamine labs earlier this year during a one-day onslaught to deny Taliban insurgents income from the lucrative drug trade.  The raids killed at least 30 civilians according to a UN investigation and may have killed a further 30. The UN also said the raids broke international law because drugs workers are not considered a legitimate military target.  American forces in Afghanistan immediately disputed the reports findings, saying they disagreed with the UN's methods, analysis and “narrow definition” of legitimate targets.  A spokesman said the labs had been under lengthy surveillance before they were struck and “extraordinary measures” had been taken to avoid killing civilians. Col Sonny Leggett said he was “deeply concerned” by the UN's methods and findings.  Taliban insurgents have long been accused of obtaining huge sums from the country's extensive opium trade, as militants tax production and levy protection money. Methamphetamine production has recently been added to the country's drugs business, with UN officials earlier this year warning seizures were growing exponentially.


thetorontostar--2019-12-26--UN condemns attack that killed 17 civilians in north Yemen

CAIRO - The United Nations has condemned an airstrike on a busy market that killed at least 17 people earlier this week in northern Yemen, a region which has been under control of Yemen’s Iran-backed rebels known as Houthis.  The office of the U.N. human rights co-ordinator in Yemen did not say who was behind the attack but a Saudi-led coalition has been waging war against the Houthis since 2015, trying to restore the internationally recognized government to power. Thousands of Yemeni civilians have died in airstrikes.  The U.N. statement said that along with the 17 killed, including 12 Ethiopian migrants who had reached Yemen in search of a better life, another 12 civilians were wounded in the strike on the Al-Raqw market in the northern province of Saada on Tuesday.  It was the third time in a month that the market had been targeted, the U.N. added, saying the number of killed and wounded in the three attacks has reached 89. The local Houthi rebel authorities heavily restrict access for journalists and rights groups to the region of Saada, which has seen some of the war’s worst fighting.  The attacks on the market are deeply troubling, said the Yemen U.N humanitarian co-ordinator, Lise Grande. “Every attack of this kind is a gross violation. The parties responsible for this, and other atrocities, must be held accountable.”  Yemen’s conflict erupted in 2014, when the Houthis overran the capital, Sanaa, and much of the north, pushing out Yemen’s internationally recognized government and ushering in a civil war that has killed tens of thousands of people. The fighting has also left millions suffering from food and medical shortages and pushed the country to the brink of famine.  Houthi spokesman Yehia Sarea tweeted later on Wednesday that “these crimes” by the the Saudi-led coalition “will not go by unnoticed“ and pledged that the victims would be avenged. He put the death toll at least 20. The two different tolls could not immediately be reconciled.  Sarea also posted images on social media purporting to show the casualties from the airstrike.  Get more of the Star in your inbox Never miss the latest news from the Star. Sign up for our newsletters to get today's top stories, your favourite columnists and lots more in your inbox Sign Up Now


channel4uk--2019-05-29--Civilians reportedly killed in Syrian government onslaught on Idlib

Syrian activists say at least 14 people have been killed in the latest onslaught by government warplanes and artillery on the last rebel stronghold in the country.  The attacks mark a month since government forces escalated their offensive on Idlib, which is home to three million people and where the UN says humanitarian operations are at risk due to the bombardment.  A warning: there are some distressing images in this report.


airwars--2019-04-25--At least 1,600 civilians died in US-led Coalition actions at Raqqa, major new study finds

Amnesty and Airwars investigation says civilian harm during battle for Raqqa is ten times higher than Coalition admits  A major new study by Amnesty International and Airwars has concluded that at least 1,600 civilians died in Coalition strikes on the city of Raqqa in 2017 during the battle to evict so-called Islamic State – ten times the number of fatalities so far conceded by the US-led alliance, which had admitted 159 deaths to April 24th.  The two organisations are calling on the US and its British and French allies to properly investigate all reports of civilian harm at Raqqa; to be transparent about their tactics, methods of attack, choice of targets, and precautions taken in the planning and execution of their strikes; and to create a fund to ensure that victims and their families receive full reparation and compensation.  The major project – which saw Amnesty field researchers on the ground for almost two months in Raqqa – is featured in a new interactive website, Rhetoric versus Reality: How the ‘most precise air campaign in history’ left Raqqa the most destroyed city in modern times, which is described by Amnesty as ‘the most comprehensive investigation into civilian deaths in a modern conflict.’  “Thousands of civilians were killed or injured in the US-led Coalition’s offensive to rid Raqqa of IS, whose snipers and mines had turned the city into a death trap. Many of the air bombardments were inaccurate and tens of thousands of artillery strikes were indiscriminate, so it is no surprise they killed and injured many hundreds of civilians,” says Donatella Rovera, Senior Crisis Response Adviser at Amnesty International.  “Coalition forces razed Raqqa, but they cannot erase the truth. Amnesty International and Airwars call upon the Coalition forces to end their denial about the shocking scale of civilian deaths and destruction caused by their offensive in Raqqa.”  Almost 500 alleged Coalition harm events have so far been identified by Amnesty and Airwars researchers during the battle for Raqqa, in which more than 3,000 civilians were locally alleged killed.  On four site visits to the broken city, Amnesty researchers spent a total of around two months on the ground, carrying out site investigations at more than 200 strike locations and interviewing more than 400 witnesses and survivors.  Amnesty International’s innovative Strike Trackers project also identified when each of more than 11,000 destroyed buildings in Raqqa was hit. More than 3,000 digital activists in 124 countries took part, analysing a total of more than two million satellite image frames. The organisation’s Digital Verification Corps, based at six universities around the world, also analysed and authenticated video footage captured during the battle.  Airwars researchers had independently tracked 429 locally alleged civilian harm events during the battle for Raqqa, and this comprehensive dataset also formed a key part of the study.  Three Airwars team members were seconded to the Raqqa project, where they worked alongside Amnesty researchers to analyse open-source evidence – including thousands of social media posts and other material – and to build a database of more than 1,600 civilians credibly reported killed in Coalition strikes.  The organisations also gathered names for more than 1,000 of the victims. Amnesty International has directly verified 641 of those names on the ground in Raqqa, while there are very strong multiple source reports for the rest.  Shihab Halep from the Airwars Syria team helped build the database of victim names for Raqqa. “We were able to document at least 1,000 civilians killed by the Coalition and its proxies on the ground. The international community needs to find a way to hold Coalition forces accountable for their actions, to ensure that the same will not be committed in the future and to bring justice for these innocent victims and for their families,” he says.  Hanna Rullmann and Sophie Dyer worked with Amnesty to incorporate Airwars’ own findings into the study – along with the organisation’s engagements with the Coalition on hundreds of reported casualty events: “Bringing together Airwars’ vast remote monitoring data with Amnesty’s field investigations was a huge undertaking. Victim names became invaluable in matching the different research threads. The result is a comprehensive and undeniable picture of massive civilian loss of life throughout the battle,” says Sophie.  By the time the offensive to capture Raqqa began in June 2017, ISIS had ruled the city for almost four years. Previous investigations by Amnesty and others detailed how the terror group had perpetrated war crimes and crimes against humanity, torturing or killing anyone who dared oppose it.  However as the new study reports, most of the destruction during the battle for Raqqa was caused by incoming Coalition air and artillery strikes – with at least 21,000 munitions fired into the city over a four month period. The United Nations would later declare it the most destroyed city in Syria, with an estimated 70% laid waste.  Both Amnesty and Airwars have frequently shared their findings on civilian harm at Raqqa with the US-led alliance. As a result, the Coalition has so far admitted responsibility for killing 159 civilians – around 10% of the minimum likely toll, according to the new study.  The Coalition has routinely dismissed the remainder of reported deaths as “non-credible.” Yet to date the alliance has failed to adequately probe civilian casualty reports, or to interview witnesses and survivors – admitting that it does not carry out site investigations.  “The Coalition needs to fully investigate what went wrong at Raqqa and learn from those lessons, to prevent inflicting such tremendous suffering on civilians caught in future military operations,” says Chris Woods, Director of Airwars.  Raqqa has been described by the United Nations as the most destroyed city in Syria (Image courtesy of Amnesty International)  Rhetoric versus Reality brings to life the stories of families who lived and died by taking users on a journey through Raqqa: meeting survivors, hearing their testimonies and visiting their destroyed homes. From the bombed-out bridges spanning the Euphrates to the largely demolished old city near the central stadium, no neighbourhood was spared.  Developed with Holoscribe’s creative team, the interactive website combines photographs, videos, 360-degree immersive experiences, satellite imagery, maps and data visualisations to highlight the cases and journeys of civilians caught under the Coalition’s bombardment. Users can also explore data on civilians who were killed, many of them after having fled from place to place across the city.  One of the first neighbourhoods to be targeted was Dara’iya, a low-rise, poorer district in western Raqqa.  In a ramshackle, half-destroyed house, Fatima, nine years old at the time, described how she lost three of her siblings and her mother, Aziza, when the Coalition rained volleys of artillery shells down on their neighbourhood on the morning of June 10th 2017. They were among 16 civilians killed on that street on that day alone. Fatima lost her right leg and her left leg was badly injured. She now uses a wheelchair donated by an NGO to get around and her only wish is to go to school.  In December 2017 the Coalition dismissed the event as ‘non credible’ – claiming that “there is insufficient evidence to find that civilians were harmed in this strike.”  In another tragic incident, a Coalition air strike destroyed an entire five-storey residential building near Maari school in the central Harat al-Badu neighbourhood in the early evening of September 25th 2017. Four families were sheltering in the basement at the time. Almost all of them – at least 32 civilians, including 20 children – were killed. Again, the Coalition would later dismiss the event as ‘non credible.  “Planes were bombing and rockets were falling 24 hours a day, and there were IS snipers everywhere. You just couldn’t breathe,” one survivor of the September 25th strike, Ayat Mohammed Jasem, told a TV crew when she returned to her destroyed home more than a year later.  “I saw my son die, burnt in the rubble in front of me. I’ve lost everyone who was dear to me. My four children, my husband, my mother, my sister, my whole family. Wasn’t the goal to free the civilians? They were supposed to save us, to save our children.”  Many of the cases documented for the project likely amount to violations of international humanitarian law and warrant further investigation, says Amnesty. Despite their own best efforts, NGOs like Amnesty and Airwars will never have the resources to investigate the full extent of civilian deaths and injuries in Raqqa.  The organisations are therefore urging US-led Coalition members to take three key steps. • To put in place an independent, impartial mechanism to effectively and promptly investigate reports of civilian harm, including violations of international humanitarian law, and make the findings public. • That Coalition members who carried out the strikes, notably the USA, the UK and France, must be transparent about their tactics, specific means and methods of attack, choice of targets, and precautions taken in the planning and execution of their attacks. • And that Coalition members must create a fund to ensure that victims and their families receive full reparation and compensation.  A spokesperson for the Coalition told Airwars that the alliance takes all allegations of civilian harm seriously: “The current number for completed investigations of civilian casualties between June-October 2017 is 180. Of note, there are still open allegations under investigation. Amnesty International provided us with 86 new allegations, 43 of which had already been assessed as credible and previously reported or were deemed not credible because the allegation did not corroborate with our strike records. We requested that Amnesty International provide us with additional information on the remaining 43 allegations if they have it so that we would be able to determine whether we could conduct an investigation.”  The spokesperson added that “We are willing to work with anyone making allegations or providing new, credible information. We continue to be open and transparent about our strikes and civilian casualty reports, which are posted and can be checked online.”


airwars--2019-10-22--Investigation accuses Dutch military of involvement in 2015 Iraq airstrike which led to deaths of 70

Investigation accuses Dutch military of involvement in 2015 Iraq airstrike which led to deaths of 70 civilians

Airwars suspends cooperation with Netherlands defence ministry until possible role of Dutch F-16s in lethal event is clarified  On Friday October 18th, Dutch news organisations NRC and NOS published a story in which they accused the Dutch military of being responsible for a 2015 airstrike on an ISIS weapon storage facility in the city of Hawijah, Iraq, that led to the deaths of at least 70 civilians. The Dutch Ministry of Defence has so far refused to confirm or deny its involvement in one of the deadliest Coalition airstrikes in the war against ISIS.  Airwars has since announced the suspension of its ongoing engagement with defence ministry on transparency and accountability issues, until the Dutch government confirms or denies whether it was involved in the event.  On the night of June 2nd-3rd, 2015, aircraft belonging to the international Coalition against ISIS bombed an IED facility in the city of Hawijah, in Iraq’s Kirkuk province. Subsequent explosions from stored munitions killed at least 70 civilians, Coalition officials confirmed to NRC and NOS.  The Airwars assessment of the incident, based on local reporting and investigations by others, concluded that at least 26 children and 22 women were among those killed at Hawijah that day. Many victims were refugees from other parts of the country, who had found shelter in buildings surrounding the weapon storage facility. More than 100 civilians were also injured in the attack. According to local reports Airwars analysed, as many as 100 ISIS militants may also additionally have been killed.  Until now, no Coalition member has publicly claimed responsibility for an airstrike that Bas News described at the time as “one of the worst mass casualty incidents in Iraq since the 2003 invasion.” Journalists at the Dutch newspaper NRC and the public broadcasting foundation NOS investigated the incident for many months, as they suspected possible Dutch involvement following a letter sent by the Ministers of Foreign Affairs and Defence to the House of Representatives in April 2018.  In that letter, ministers revealed that the Dutch Public Prosecution Service had investigated four air strikes – out of a total of approximately 2,100 munitions released – that the Netherlands had carried out between October 2014 and June 2016. The Public Prosecution Service concluded that three out of the four investigated incidents indeed seemed to have led to civilian casualties. However any further information on these four strikes – such as place, date and time of the attack – was omitted. The Public Prosecution Service furthermore stated that while it was likely that these three Dutch strikes had killed civilians, it saw no reason to prosecute as in its view, the rules of war had been followed.  At the time, researchers and journalists noted that the first described case in the letter showed a potential resemblance to what had happened in Hawijah, three years earlier. The two ministers wrote about this first incident that “it […] was an attack by Dutch F-16s on a facility where so-called vehicle borne IEDs [car bombs] were manufactured. […] The IED factory later turned out to have contained many more explosives than was known or could be estimated in advance. It is very likely that this attack resulted in civilian casualties.” Requests for confirmation by Airwars and journalists on whether the ministry was indeed referring to the incident of Hawija have remained unanswered until now.  In a press conference the day after the Hawijah incident, American commander Lt General John Hesterman had also said that a “fairly small weapon” was used in the strike. According to NRC’s reconstruction of their investigation, weapon experts it consulted had concluded Hesterman must have been talking about GBU-39 Small Diameter Bombs. In 2015, only two Coalition allies were using this type of munition in their military actions in Syria and Iraq: the United States and the Netherlands. However US and British armed drones were also using smaller 100lb Hellfire missiles at the time.  Both NRC and NOS visited the site of the airstrike in 2019, collecting on the ground statements from affected communities. They furthermore spoke to both US and Dutch officials. Kees Versteegh, one of the journalists working on the investigation, said in NRC’s daily podcast that several anonymous officials had confirmed to him that it was in fact a Dutch F16 that dropped the bomb.  Responding to the investigation, Minister of Defence Ank Bijleveld tweeted that she could “neither confirm nor deny” Dutch responsibility for the Hawijah incident “at this moment”, but that she hoped to be able to do so in the near future. “We want to put the safety of everyone, especially the pilots, first”, Bijleveld stated, according to NRC. Prime Minister Mark Rutte was also questioned by journalists about the allegations, but answered that “while it is terrible when civilian casualties occur”, that he could not comment on the allegations.  Defence Minister Ank Bijleveld says she can ‘neither confirm nor deny’ Dutch involvement in a deadly 2015 strike  Members of Parliament have been demanding that the Minister provides clarity on the topic, so far unsuccessfully. Sadet Karabulut, MP for the opposition Socialist Party (SP), who has submitted several motions regarding transparency on civilian casualties in the past, tweeted: “We weren’t told anything at all. Every time, we asked for [information]. We never got an answer. The minister has a problem if this is true and has a lot to explain. I want to know everything. All information should be on the table now very quickly, and we should have a debate.”  MP Isabelle Diks of GroenLinks stated that “it is unbelievable that the House of Representatives is only now hearing through the press, that in the event of a Dutch attack, so many civilian victims have fallen, while the House of Representatives has specifically asked about this on several occasions.” She said she expected an explanation from the Minister soon.  Joël Voordewind, MP for the ChristenUnie, also demanded answers on Twitter: “Why was there no follow-up investigation by the Public Prosecutor’s Office on the bombing in Hawija, hardly any compensation paid, and why was it not foreseen that a second explosion could occur, resulting in so many civilian casualties? I expect clear answers.”  And Salima Belhaj, MP for D66 which is a part of the government coalition, insisted that future civilian casualties must be communicated as fast as possible to parliament.  While the Dutch government has so far yet to officially confirm its involvement in the deadly attack, Defence Minister Bijleveld made a further statement on October 19th regarding compensation for relatives of the victims of the airstrike and those who suffered material loss. According to NOS, Bijleveld claimed that “it is the international agreement that it will be settled in the country itself [Iraq]”. This contradicts statements made by CENTCOM to Airwars in 2016 that each member nation of the alliance was individually responsible for any payouts for civilian harm resulting from its own actions.  Airwars and Airwars Stichting issued a statement noting that it would be a “national scandal if the defence ministry and successive governments have withheld the death of 70 civilians resulting from a Dutch military action more than 4 years ago”, and calling for an urgent factual statement from both the Ministry of Defence and the government. Airwars has additionally suspended planned further talks with defence officials on transparency and accountability for civilian harm, until the Dutch government has publicly clarified any involvement in this incident.


france24--2019-07-01--Israeli missile strike kills civilians says Syrian state media

Israeli missile strike kills civilians, says Syrian state media

Jack Guez, AFP | An F-16 Block 52 fighter jet, belonging to the Polish air force, takes off during the 'Blue Flag' multinational air defence exercise at the Ovda air force base, north of the Israeli city of Eilat, on November 8, 2017.  Israeli warplanes fired missiles targeting Syrian military positions in Homs and the Damascus outskirts in an attack that killed at least four civilians and wounded another 21, Syrian state media said.  The Syrian military said Syrian air defences had confronted the attack, which was launched from Lebanese airspace.  An Israeli military spokeswoman, asked about the report, said: "We don't comment on such reports."  Syrian state-run broadcaster al-Ikhbariya said the four civilians including a baby had been killed in Sahnaya, south of Damascus, as "a result of the Zionist aggression".  State news agency SANA said an additional 21 people had been wounded. SANA also reported that Syrian air defences had brought down a number of the missiles.  In recent years, Israel has carried out hundreds of strikes in Syria that it says have targeted its regional arch foe, Iran, and the Lebanese Hezbollah group, which it calls the biggest threat to its borders.  Iran and Hezbollah are fighting on the side of President Bashar al-Assad in the Syrian war, and Israel says they are trying to turn Syria into a new front against Israelis.


france24--2019-07-26--In northwestern Syria civilians continue to die in a war that wont end

In northwestern Syria, civilians continue to die in a war that won't end

Many are still dying in the Syrian government's three-month-long raid on Idlib, the last province still holding out against the regime. Syrian photographer Anas al-Dyab, who was working with AFP, is one of the latest victims.  Every day, several dozen people perish under the bombs. In Syria, Russian and regime air raids on the northwestern province of Idlib, which still eludes the control of President Bashar al-Assad, and on the neighbouring provinces of Aleppo, Hamah, and Lattakia remain intense.  In the past 10 days, air strikes by the Syrian government and its allies on schools, hospitals, markets and bakeries have killed at least 103 civilians, including 26 children, UN human rights chief Michelle Bachelet said in a statement on Friday.  “These are civilian objects, and it seems highly unlikely, given the persistent pattern of such attacks, that they are all being hit by accident,” Bachelet said, adding that the rising toll had been met with “apparent international indifference”.  Among the many victims of the conflict is Anas al-Dyab, a 22-year-old photographer and videographer who worked with AFP and whose photos were published by FRANCE 24 along with articles on Syria.  The young man was killed on July 21 in air strikes on the town of Khan Sheikhoun along with 17 other civilians, according to the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights (OSDH) and the White Helmets, a volunteer search and rescue organization operating in rebel areas. Anas al-Dyab was one of their volunteers.  The funeral of the citizen journalist was held in a mosque before his remains, wrapped in a shroud bearing the White Helmets logo, were buried in a cemetery in Idlib city. The bombings prevented him from being buried in Khan Sheikhoun.  "He was killed while trying to show the world what's happening in Syria."  "This is a great loss for us," Raëd Saleh, the director of the White Helmets, told AFP, accusing Moscow and Damascus of complicity with the rebels and jihadists. “He was killed while trying to show the world what is happening in Syria.”  According to the OSDH, the freelance photographer, who had been wounded several times during the conflict, lost his life while taking refuge in the basement of a three-storey building. He was with two members of the rebel group Jaich al-Ezza, formerly supported by Washington and active in parts of Idlib province and neighbouring Hama province.  "I will only leave Khan Sheikhoun as a martyr," he had once vowed, according to his family. CNN, which interviewed him in March, paid tribute to him by publishing several of the photos he had taken in recent months.  Since western journalists have great difficulty covering the war in Syria, al-Dyab’s job was to document, through photos on his Twitter account, the daily lives of the country’s inhabitants, the white helmet rescue operations in which he was involved and the aftermath of the bombings on Khan Sheikhoun. The town, targeted in April 2017 by a sarin gas attack that the UN attributed to the Syrian regime, was deserted after several thousand inhabitants fled.  "They target innocent civilians and try to kill as many of us as possible," he said from a hospital bed, where he was being treated for leg injuries he sustained during a bombing on September 8, 2018 while filming the damage caused by a previous air raid. While calling for help, he left his camera running to record "evidence to incriminate this criminal [President Bashar al-Assad] and send him to an international court".  More than 630 civilians killed since the end of April  The Damascus regime and its Russian ally have intensified their bombardments of the Idlib region, which has been dominated by rebels and jihadists, including the Hayat Tahrir al-Sham group (the former Syrian branch of Al Qaeda), since late April. Over the last three months, more than 630 civilians have died, according to the OSDH, while more than 400,000 people have been displaced, according to the UN.  "Idlib's nightmare is getting worse. We have witnessed one of the deadliest attacks on civilian areas since the beginning of the military escalation almost three months ago," Mark Cutts, the United Nations’ Deputy Regional Humanitarian Coordinator for the Syria Crisis said on July 22.  The military action continues despite a September 2018 agreement between Russia and Turkey supporting certain rebel groups and aimed at preventing a major offensive in Idlib by forces loyal to Damascus. The agreement provided for a "demilitarized zone" to separate territories held by jihadists and rebels from those held by the government.


globalresearch--2019-07-01--Videos Israeli Strikes on Damascus and Homs Injure and Kill Many Civilians

Videos: Israeli Strikes on Damascus and Homs Injure and Kill Many Civilians

Early on July 1, Israeli warplanes carried out a series of airstrike on several military targets in the Syrian capital of Damascus and in the central governorate of Homs.  The Syrian Arab Air Defense Forces (SyAAF) intercepted several Israeli missiles over Damascus and south of Homs. However, most of the missiles hit their targets.  According to pro-government sources, military positions in the districts of al-Mazzeh, al-Dimass and Jomrayah north and northwest of Damascus, as well as three bases in the outskirt of the city of Homs were hit.  One of the Israeli missiles hit a civilian area in the district of Sahnaya west of Damascus. The Syrian Arab News Agency (SANA) said that 4 civilians, including a 3-month old baby, were killed as a result. 22 other civilians, mostly women and children, were injured.  This was the first time an Israeli strike on Syria led to civilian casualties. This is a dangerous development that may force Damascus to rethink its strategy towards Israel.  The Israeli strike was one of the biggest this year, which confirms that Tel Aviv is not only determined to go on with its attacks on Syria, but also to step-up their scale and intensity.  Note to readers: please click the share buttons above or below. Forward this article to your email lists. Crosspost on your blog site, internet forums. etc.


mintpressnews--2019-02-26--Scores of Civilians Left Dead in Wake of Saudi Air Campaign on Yemen-Saudi Border

YEMENI-SAUDI BORDER — As the widely unpopular Saudi-led, U.S.-backed war on Yemen continues to push the country deeper into one of the world’s worst humanitarian crises, Saudi Arabia has launched a vicious campaign to secure Jizan, its vulnerable southern border region with Yemen, which has been its Achilles heel in its brutal assault on its southern neighbor. Yemen’s Houthi fighters, the primary force resisting the Saud-led occupation of Yemen, frequently target the Saudi military in Jizan, sending a stark reminder to the Kingdom that its war on Yemen will inevitably be felt at home.  Scores of civilians were killed in the past week after Saudi Arabia launched a fresh round of airstrikes against the Saudi-Yemeni border region of Hajjah in northwestern Yemen. Most of the victims, including many women and children, were from a single family that resided in the strategic Kushar directorate, an area Saudi Arabia has been attempting to capture since last week.  Two civilians were also killed in a separate Saudi airstrike on Sunday that targeted a rescue operation in the al-Safiah district of Hajjah. Rescuers were attempting to recover victims from the rubble of a home that was leveled in a previous Saudi airstrike when Saudi jets returned and attacked the home a second time. That same day in Nihm, which lies southeast of Hajjah, Saudi airstrikes targeted the home of Saleh Mohammed al-Tuggi, killing three women and an elderly man.  Saudi ground forces — comprised of an array of local mercenaries and allied Salafi extremist groups, including al Qaeda, and equipped with the latest U.S.-supplied weaponry — have been fighting a fierce ground campaign to take the high ground on the Saudi-Yemeni border district that overlooks Hajjah’s strategic city of Haradh.  Haradh lies near the Saudi border region of Jizan.  On the outskirts of Haradh, Saudi warplanes and Apache attack helicopters conducted airstrikes on the Kuhlan al-Sharf district, hitting a dozen targets including the al-Sudah school and forcing hundreds of civilians to flee to Hajjah city and to the nearby capital, Sana’a.  Responding to the Saudi incursion, the Houthis and allied Yemeni military renewed attacks on military positions in southern Saudi Arabia, taking control of a number of sites in areas east of the Jizan and Najran regions and killing dozens of Saudi and foreign troops, as well as capturing Western-supplied weapons.  Saudi authorities said in a statement Saturday evening that the soldiers had been killed in battles with the Houthis in Saudi Arabia’s southern border regions. The Saudi military also published images of a funeral of one of the soldiers in the al-Ahsa region.  Yemen’s Houthi-allied armed forces announced that they struck a gathering of Saudi troops in the al-Bug district north of Sa’ada with a high-precision Badr P-1 ballistic missile. The attack left an unspecified number of soldiers either killed or wounded, according to a Yemeni armed-forces source.  The media branch of the Houthis’ political wing, Ansar Allah, released footage showing strategic Saudi military locations being captured deep inside Saudi territory. The footage shows U.S., and what appears to be Austrian weapons caches, captured when the Houthis took control of Saudi military bases in al-Sawh in Saudi Arabia’s southwestern region of Najran, 900 kilometers (559 miles) south of the Saudi capital Riyadh.  Watch | Houthi forces after they captured a Saudi military position in southern Saudi Arabia. Weapons caches can be seen in the background  Despite being equipped with the latest U.S.armaments, Saudi troops and their allied mercenaries fled their posts upon confrontation, leaving behind caches of weapons including American-made armored vehicles as well as Austrian Kalashnikovs and sniper rifles.  A source inside of Yemen’s military revealed that the Houthi-allied Yemeni army plans to launch additional operations in a bid to control more Saudi military sites inside the Kingdom’s southern regions of Jizan, Asir and Najran, for as long as the coalition continues its military campaign against Yemen’s Hajjah province. ِA commander of the Saudi Electronic Planning Squad was also killed after his armored vehicle was targeted in Hadabah Sudeis in Najran, southern Saudi Arabia.  The ongoing Saudi-led military campaign against Yemen has resulted in the deaths of 15,250 civilians, including 3,527 children and 2,277 women, according to the Legal Center for Rights and Development in Yemen, a non-governmental organization monitoring human-rights violations immediately after their occurrence. These figures will likely increase as a result of the latest Saudi attacks on Hajjah. Other groups have put the number of civilians killed in the war much higher.  Moreover, 23,822 civilians — among them 3,526 children and 2,587 women — have sustained injuries and are suffering from a shortage of medical supplies and treatment resulting from a crippling Saudi land, air, and sea blockade. The Center further noted that the Saudi-led Coalition has caused the deaths of nearly 2,200 Yemenis from cholera.  According to a statement given to MintPress News by a high-ranking military official in Yemen, the latest fighting has resulted in the deaths of a number of British military personnel.  The high-ranking source told MintPress that at least nine British soldiers were killed or injured in the mountainous northwestern province of Sa’ada near Saudi Arabia’s southern border region of Najran on February 24, when the Yemeni army, supported by Houthis fighters, launched a military operation against British-led mercenary forces as they were preparing to launch an attack.  A yet unknown number of British soldiers were also killed in the Marib province of eastern Yemen when the Houthi-allied Yemeni military targeted British SAS (Special Air Service) battalions. The SAS troops were traveling in unmarked trucks and dressed in local Yemeni clothes, according to a military source who also confirmed that a number of British troops were evacuated in an Emirati helicopter to a U.S. military base in Djibouti.  A high-ranking Saudi military commander — Brigadier General Salih Balaid al-Marqashi, commander of Saudi operations in the Baqim district of Sa’ada — was killed on Friday when Houthi-allied Yemeni troops mounted an attack to retake the Murabba Shaja area near Saudi Arabia’s southern border region of Najran.  The Coalition, led by Saudi Arabia and backed by the United States and other Western powers, has killed tens of thousands of Yemeni civilians since 2015 when the war began. Moreover, the coalition’s blockade of food and medicine has plagued the country with an unprecedented famine and triggered a deadly outbreak of preventable disease that has cost thousands of civilians their lives.  Top Photo | A screenshot from a video released by the Houthi-affiliated Ansar Allah Media Center, shows the moment a Saudi jet targeted a home in Yemen’s Hajjah province near the Yemen-Saudi border.  Screenshot | AMC  Ahmed AbdulKareem is a Yemeni journalist. He covers the war in Yemen for MintPress News as well as local Yemeni media.


mintpressnews--2019-04-29--US-Led Bombing Campaign in Syria Killed 1600 Civilians and Left Raqqa Most Destroyed City in Moder

US-Led Bombing Campaign in Syria Killed 1,600 Civilians and Left Raqqa ‘Most Destroyed City in Modern Times’

An “unprecedented” new study released on Thursday revealed that the U.S.-led bombing campaign on Raqqa, Syria in 2017—which one military commander at the time claimed was the “most precise air campaign in history”—killed an estimated 1,600 innocent civilians while leveling the city on a scale unparalleled in recent decades.  The research collated almost two years of investigations into the assault on Raqqa, the groups said in a statement,  and “gives a brutally vivid account” of the enormous number of civilian lives lost as “a direct result” of thousands of coalition air strikes and tens of thousands of US artillery strikes in Raqqa from June to October 2017.  The report—”Rhetoric vs. Reality: How the ‘Most Precise Air Campaign in History’ Left Raqqa the Most Destroyed City in Modern Times“—is detailed on the interactive website created by investigative news organization Airwars and the human rights group Amnesty International-USA which carried out what they call the “most comprehensive investigation into civilian deaths in a modern conflict.”  The findings confirm that the U.S.-led coalition has admitted to just a fraction of the civilian carnage it has caused in Syria, even as it has boasted of the care it’s taken in avoiding such casualties and the precision of the Raqqa offensive.  According to the report:  US, UK and French forces also launched thousands of air strikes into civilian neighborhoods, scores of which resulted in mass civilian casualties. In one tragic incident, a Coalition air strike destroyed an entire five-story residential building near Maari school in the central Harat al-Badu neighborhood in the early evening of 25 September 2017. Four families were sheltering in the basement at the time. Almost all of them – at least 32 civilians, including 20 children – were killed. A week later, a further 27 civilians – including many relatives of those killed in the earlier strike – were also killed when an air strike destroyed a nearby building.”  “I saw my son die, burnt in the rubble in front of me,” Ayet Mohammed Jasem, one of the few survivors of the later attack, told the investigators. “I’ve lost everyone who was dear to me. My four children, my husband, my mother, my sister, my whole family. Wasn’t the goal to free the civilians? They were supposed to save us, to save our children.”  At the time of 2017 assault on Raqqa it was U.S. Lieutenant General Stephen J. Townswend, commander of the coalition, who said,  “I challenge anyone to find a more precise air campaign in the history of warfare…The Coalition’s goal is always for zero human casualties.”  But the researchers argue the evidence belies those claims and, as part of the report, both groups demanded accountability for what was done to the city and its people.  “The coalition needs to fully investigate what went wrong at Raqqa and learn from those lessons, to prevent inflicting such tremendous suffering on civilians caught in future military operations,” said Chris Woods, director of Airwars, in a statement.  Donatella Rovera, a crisis investigator for Amnesty, shared some of what she found in Raqqa in a video the group released along with the report.  “When I first came to Raqqa after the war, I knew that relentless American, British, and French bombardment killed civilians and destroyed much of the city,” Rovera said.  “What I came to discover was that little or no protection was afforded to the thousands of civilians who were trapped in the city,” she added. “Raqqa is the most destroyed city in modern times in terms of percentage. There is no part of Raqqa which has been left untouched.”  During their investigation, the groups also listened to the stories of survivors like nine year old Fatima Hussein Ahmad who lost her mother, Aziza, and three siblings in artillery strikes on their neighborhood. as well sustaining injuries that required the amputation of her right leg. “I was thrown over there by the explosion,” she told Amnesty during an interview from a burnt out home near where the attack took place.  Almost two years later, she still cannot walk and uses a wheelchair donated by an NGO to get around. She told the researchers her only wish is to go back to school.  The interactive website contains a whole section of stories from the ground, including one of 32 people, 20 children among them, who were killed in an air strike near a school and another where civilians were targeted as they crossed a river with no way to escape.  The U.S. has claimed to have unleashed 30,000 rounds of artillery on the city during the offensive, while the U.K. and France helped to carry out thousands of air strikes. The U.S. strikes represent the equivalent of one strike every six minutes for four months.  “Many of the air bombardments were inaccurate and tens of thousands of artillery strikes were indiscriminate, so it is no surprise they killed and injured many hundreds of civilians,” said Rovera.  “Coalition forces razed Raqqa, but they cannot erase the truth,” she added. “Amnesty International and Airwars call upon the Coalition forces to end their denial about the shocking scale of civilian deaths and destruction caused by their offensive.”  Civilians—who for four years had been essentially held captive in Raqqa by ISIS as the armed group set up checkpoints restricting movement, planted land mines in exit routes, and used residents as human shields—suffered fresh brutality from the U.S. and its allies as they claimed to be “liberating” the city.  The two groups interviewed about 400 survivors and surveyed 200 attack sites throughout the city, examining the ruins of residential buildings and neighborhoods.  Analyzing social media posts, satellite images, and other material, Amnesty and Airwars have identified the shellings that destroyed about 11,000 buildings and the names of more than 1,000 victims.  But even with access to the groups’ meticulous research, which they have shared with the coalition, military leaders have admitted to only 159 civilian deaths during the Raqqa campaign—10 percent of the number determined by Airwars and Amnesty—despite the fact that the coalition does not carry out its own investigations.  The report comes ahead of an expected report from the Trump administration regarding civilian casualties that resulted from the coalition’s strikes.  “We hope to finally see an honest assessment of the devastating impact that U.S. lethal strikes have had on the civilians in Raqqa,” said Daphne Eviatar, director of Amnesty’s Security with Human Rights program. “The public deserves to know how many civilian casualties our government is responsible for, and the survivors deserve acknowledgement, reparations, where appropriate, and meaningful assistance to rebuild their lives.”  Feature Photo | A U.S.-backed Syrian fighter from the SDF stands amidst the ruins of buildings near the Clock Square in Raqqa, Syria October 18, 2017. (Erik De Castro/Reuters)


mintpressnews--2019-09-24--Saudis Blame Iran for Aramco Strikes But Retaliate by Bombing Yemeni Civilians

AMRAN, YEMEN — Unlike the burning fields of neighboring Saudi Arabia, in Yemen scenes of massive fires have become commonplace, a reality that civilians do not accept but have come to expect. For nearly five years, since the Saudi-led Coalition began its bombing campaign in Yemen, Yemeni residents have watched as their neighbors’ homes have burned to the ground, often with whole families still inside, and as schools, factories, hospitals, mosques, and markets are rendered into piles of soot and ash following massive infernos sparked by near-constant Saudi airstrikes. Yet, unlike the attacks on Saudi oil facilities, rarely do the attacks on Yemen garner international media coverage or condemnation.  Thirty-two-year-old Yemeni Bedouin Saleh Masoud Jarwan did not expect that he and his family would be the next victims of the Saudi airstrikes, but on Monday Saleh was killed along with six family members in an airstrike by Coalition jets in Yemen’s Amran province. Saleh had hoped that Yemen would be safe after the attack on the Saudi Aramco facility, assuming that the attack would be enough to encourage the Kingdom to halt its drone and missile attacks against Yemen.  The scene of the attack was illuminated in red from the massive fires that followed the airstrikes, and this fire was not fueled by oil but by the bodies of more than ten civilians, including women and children. The screaming and crying of two children who survived the initial onslaught provided a backdrop to the shouts of rescuers who frantically worked their shovels and called out to victims as they worked to free Saleh and his family from the rubble of the mosque that collapsed on them in the airstrike.  The Coalition is estimated to have carried out at least 42 airstrikes in just a 24-hour period alone. By 2 a.m. on Sunday, local residents in the al-Sawad district of North Amran were living in horror as they sheltered in schools and mosques hoping to escape death from above as at least 12 Coalition airstrikes leveled their neighborhood. Thekra, Moamer, and Kubra — three young girls between the ages of three and eight — were among those who took refuge in a local mosque, only to be killed after Saudi warplanes brought it down over their heads.  In the village of al-Addi in the Harf Sufyan district, the air was suffused with the smell of charred bodies after a Saudi airstrike hit a car, instantly killing the two civilians inside. That attack was followed hours later by airstrikes targeting the nearby home of Ahmed Jimaie.  On Tuesday, 16 civilians, including four women and seven children, were killed when Saudi airstrikes hit the home of Abbas al-Halmi in Qataba, Al-Dali governorate, according to a local resident who spoke to MintPress but was unable to provide further details on the attack. The bodies of three children were later recovered from the rubble of that attack, adding to the already staggering death toll. MintPress obtained graphic footage of the attack showing the father of Abbas al-Halmi retrieving the body part of one of his deceased relatives from the rubble.  The Grand Mufti of Yemen, Shams al-Din Sharaf al-Din, the highest religious authority in Yemen, laid blame on those who declared solidarity with Saudi Arabia following last week’s Aramco attacks but remain silent in the face of atrocities committed by Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates in Yemen.  These latest Saudi-led Coalition attacks came days after Yemen’s Houthis announced responsibility for a spate of retaliatory attacks against positions inside Saudi Arabia. It is unclear why the Coalition launched the ostensibly retaliatory attacks on Yemen, as they claim that it was Iran, not the Houthis, that carried out the oil-field attacks.  Mahdi al-Mashat, Ansarullah’s (the Houthis’ political bloc) president of the Supreme Political Council in the Yemeni capital, Sana’a, warned that Yemenis would not hesitate to “launch a period of great pain if their calls for peace were ignored.” Al-Mashat made the comments following an announcement that the Houthis would temporarily cease all retaliatory missile and drone attacks against the Saudi monarchy as part of a Yemeni peace initiative. Al-Mashat said:  That announcement came just three days before the Coalition launched its deadly attacks in Amran.  The United Nations welcomed Ansarullah’s proposal, saying in a statement issued on Saturday by the UN Special Envoy for Yemen, Martin Griffiths, that it marked an important opportunity to move forward with all necessary steps to reduce violence, military escalation, and unhelpful rhetoric.  Griffiths emphasized that the implementation of the proposal by the Houthis was in good faith and could send a powerful message of their will to end the war. Saudi Arabia has so far refused to accept the offer and Saudi Minister of State for Foreign Affairs Adel al-Jubeir dismissed it, saying, “We judge other parties by their deeds [and] actions and not by their words, so we will see.”  The peace initiative follows Houthi airstrikes on two of Saudi Arabia’s oil facilities in Abqaiq and Khurais, which led to a suspension of about 50 percent of the Arab kingdom’s crude and gas production. That attack on a vital economic interest of the Kingdom garnered widespread support among many in Yemen’s capital city of Sana’a. On September 14, the day of that attack, hundreds of thousands of residents from Sana’a and its neighboring provinces took to the streets carrying Yemeni flags and holding banners emblazoned with messages of steadfastness and support for Houthi drone and missile forces.  For many, the Houthis’ setting fire to the Kingdom’s Aramco oil fields represented the last hope to quell Saudi attacks on Yemen. In a staggering show of solidarity on Sunday, an estimated 1,200 cars filled the streets of 70th Area, a neighborhood in southern Sana’a, to drop off food donations for families of victims of Saudi airstrikes. According to many of the families, the attack on Aramco is revenge for the blood of the estimated 100,000 people killed in the Saudi-led Coalition’s war in Yemen.  Indeed, the Coalition has used systematic economic strangulation as a weapon of war — targeting jobs, infrastructure, the agricultural sector, fuel and water pumping stations, factories, and the provision of basic services, as well as imposing a land, sea and air embargo impacting the country’s imports, causing the spread of famine throughout the country. This, to the many in Yemen who celebrated the Aramco attack, is sufficient justification for targeting the heart of Saudi Arabia’s economy.  However, many still doubt that the Houthis were capable of carrying out an attack of the scale and range of the one that struck Saudi Arabia — instead accusing Iran of orchestrating the attacks. Others await the results of an international investigation, but the Houthis, who comprise a major component of Yemen’s resistance to Saudi interference in their country, say the evidence that they carried out the attacks exists and that they will share it with the media.  The Houthis over the past two years have launched a series of sophisticated attacks on Saudi coalition targets deep inside the Kingdom, establishing a precedent for the most recent attacks. Houthi officials say the attacks on the Aramco facilities were launched from three different locations, based on their flight endurance and designated targets, and that various types of combat drones were used in the attack, some capable of carrying four precision-guided bombs and of striking their targets from several angles.  Moreover, the Houthis’ third-generation Qasef (Striker) combat drones and long-endurance Sammad-3 (Invincible-3) drones have an operational range of 1,500 kilometers to 1,700 kilometers.  The attack on Aramco came at a time when the de facto leader of the Kingdom, Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman, was attempting to refloat the much-delayed public offering of Aramco shares, and that attack would not likely not have succeeded without the cooperation of members of Saudi royalty and former Saudi officers, according to some Houthi sources.  Feature photo | An explosion follows a Saudi-led airstrike in Sanaa, Yemen, Jan. 11, 2017. Hani Mohammed | AP  Ahmed AbdulKareem is a Yemeni journalist. He covers the war in Yemen for MintPress News as well as local Yemeni media.


newspunch--2019-07-01--Israeli Missile Attack Kills Civilians In Syria

Sixteen people,including a baby were killed and 21 injured in Israeli missile strikes near the Syrian cities of Damascus and Homs according to Syrian state media .  The Sana news agency said that Israeli jets targeted military bases,   linked to Iranian forces, from Lebanese airspace at around midnight on Sunday.  Press TV reports: The Syrian air defense earlier said its forces had shot down three missiles launched by Israeli warplanes on Sunday night from Lebanese airspace towards some Syrian sites.  SANA quoted a military source as saying that the aggression targeted military sites in Homs and the suburbs of Damascus.  The London-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights also claimed that the strikes had targeted a research center and a military airport west of the city of Homs.  Following the explosions near Damascus, Israeli jet fighters reportedly flied at low altitudes in the Lebanese airspace.  The Israeli regime launches airstrikes on the Syrian territory from time to time. Such aggressive moves are usually viewed as attempts to prop up terrorist groups suffering defeats at the hands of Syrian government forces.  Israel used to be very careful with its operations over Syria after Russia equipped Damascus with the advanced S-300 surface-to-air missiles in October 2018.


rferl--2019-03-25--Thirteen Civilians Mostly Children Believed Killed In Afghan Air Strike UN Report Finds

Thirteen Civilians, Mostly Children, Believed Killed In Afghan Air Strike, UN Report Finds

Thirteen civilians were killed, mostly children, in an air strike by "international forces" near the northern Afghan city of Kunduz last week, according to preliminary findings of the UN Assistance Mission in Afghanistan (UNAMA).      "The mission expresses serious concern that initial fact-finding indicates that 10 of those killed were children, part of the same extended famil...displaced by fighting elsewhere in the country," UNAMA said in a statement on March 25.      It said that three more civilians were apparently wounded in the incident, which occurred in the Telawka neighborhood close to Kunduz city on the night of March 22-23, during “operations conducted by pro-government forces against Taliban in the area.”      “Work is ongoing to verify all civilian casualties that occurred during military operations that were conducted around the time of the air strike,” the statement said.      A spokeswoman for the NATO-led Resolute Support mission in Afghanistan said on March 24 that U.S. forces had carried out an air strike in the area, but she said the mission had not confirmed it had caused civilian casualties.      Sergeant Debra Richardson said the mission aims to prevent civilian casualties but noted that Taliban militants intentionally hide among civilians.      The war in Afghanistan killed more civilians in 2018 than at any time since records have been kept, UNAMA said in a February report, blaming the increase on unprecedented suicide bombings by militant groups and air strikes carried out by U.S.-led forces.      It said that the conflict killed 3,804 civilians and wounded another 7,189 in 2018, an 11 percent increase from the previous year.      The civilian death toll is the highest number since UNAMA began tallying figures in 2009.


rferl--2019-07-30--UN Afghan Civilians Dying At Shocking Level

UN: Afghan Civilians Dying At 'Shocking' Level

KABUL -- A total of 1,366 civilians have been killed and 2,446 more were injured in Afghanistan's conflict during the first six months of this year, according to the United Nations.      The latest figures from the UN Assistance Mission in Afghanistan (UNAMA), released in a July 30 report, showed a 27 percent drop in casualties for the first half of 2019 compared to the same period last year, which was a record.      While the UN welcomed the drop, it "continues to regard the level of harm done to civilians as shocking and unacceptable," UNAMA said in a statement.      Afghanistan's bloody toll continued to climb amid a months-long, U.S.-led push to forge a deal with the Taliban to end the nearly 18-year war.        The Taliban controls or contests around half of Afghanistan, more territory than at any time since the U.S.-led invasion in 2001 ousted the group from power.  UNAMA said ground engagements caused the most civilian casualties in the first six months of 2019, causing one-third of the overall total, followed by the use of improvised explosive devices and air strikes.      The Taliban, the Islamic State, and other groups fighting against Afghan government forces caused 52 percent of the casualties, the report said.      Among the 985 documented civilian casualties attributed to militants were government officials, tribal elders, aid workers, religious scholars, and mullahs. Extremists were also behind attacks that caused casualties in places of worship and culture.      Pro-government forces killed 717 people and injured 680, a 31 percent increase on the same period last year.  However, a spokesman for U.S. forces in Afghanistan, USFOR-A, disputed UNAMA's data.      "USFOR-A rejects UNAMA's methods and findings. Sources with limited information and conflicted motives are not always credible," Colonel Sonny Leggett said in a statement.      "We follow the highest standards of accuracy and accountability and always work to avoid harm to civilian noncombatants," Leggett said.      UNAMA said that women continue to be "disproportionately" affected by the war, which caused the deaths of 144 women and injured 286.      Child casualties comprised nearly one-third of the overall civilian casualties, with 327 deaths and 880 injured.      U.S. peace envoy Zalmay Khalilzad is expected to return to Qatar in the next week for an eighth round of direct talks with Taliban negotiators.      The United States is aiming to achieve a peace pact that would see foreign forces quit Afghanistan in return for security guarantees by September 1, ahead of the Afghan presidential election that is scheduled toward the end of that month.      Both Washington and the Taliban have said recently that they were making progress toward reaching a peace deal, but the militant group has so far refused to meet directly with the Afghan government, saying it is illegitimate and is a puppet of foreign states.


sottnet--2019-02-13--Collateral damage When US bombs incinerated 408 civilians in Iraqs Amiriyah shelter

'Collateral damage': When US bombs incinerated 408 civilians in Iraq's Amiriyah shelter

On this day in 1991, over 400 people lost their lives when the US dropped two 2,000-pound smart bombs on a Baghdad air-raid shelter. But because it was the 'good guys' who did it, the massacre is not remembered as it should be.'Collateral damage'. The first time I remember those words being used was in the first Gulf War. There was plenty of 'collateral damage' in that conflict. In other words, lots of innocent people were killed.the BBC's Jeremy Bowen reported. One poor man said 11 of his family had been in the shelter. Another wept as he said he had lost his wife and children.The US 'defense' was that they had thought the shelter was a command and control bunker. Iraqi President Saddam Hussein was using his people as human shields. Yet, as a Human Rights Watch report later noted, the Pentagon conceded that the bunker had been used for civil defense in the Iran-Iraq war, and US officials "gave no warning that they considered its protected status as a civilian shelter to have ended."Award-winning anti-war journalist John Pilger noted the interrogation that Jeremy Bowen received when he reported on the crime. "'Are you absolutely certain it wasn't a military bunker?" he was asked, or words to that effect.Of course,And we are always told we have to 'move on' very quickly from these 'mistakes' and 'accidents'."Consider the dreadful toll of Iraqi civilian deaths in the intense bombing campaignAll this was barely mentioned at the time, even on the BBC and the 'quality' press, and is now all but forgotten," writes David Cromwell of Media Lens, in his book 'Why Are We The Good Guys?'The Iraqi press called for the US to be tried for war crimes over the Amiriyah strike. But of course it never happened. In 2001, on the 10th anniversary of the bombing, the US-funded Radio Free Iraq broadcast an interview with an unnamed Iraqi who claimed that there was something not quite right about the air-raid shelter. But even he said he did not know whether or not the bunker was a command and control center and admitted he was not in a "position to give an expert opinion."Two years later,What is revealing is how the Amiriyah Incineration has - outside of Iraq - disappeared down the memory hole. Let's suppose that instead of America or one of its allies carrying out the attack it had been Russia, Iran, or another 'official enemy'. Then we'd never have heard the last of it.We can be sure that it would have been the subject of at least one major Hollywood film and we'd have annual reminders of the heinous crime. To their credit, the British band Radiohead did write a song about the massacre entitled 'I Will' which included the lyric "little baby's eyes," but you need to search very hard for other references in popular culture.Because by not remembering the dead of Amiriyah we are saying that those killed by the US and its allies are lesser beings than those killed by its geo-strategic rivals.It's not just in Iraq where this has happened.At first they tried to blame the atrocity on Yugoslav forces. But when evidence emerged that it was a NATO strike - the alliance claimed that the pilot had believed it to be a military convoy. And of course, the blame for this "tragic accident" was passed on to the 'official enemy'."NATO regrets any harm to innocent civilians, and reminds that the circumstances in which this accident occurred are wholly the responsibility of (Yugoslav) President Milosevic and his policies," said NATO spokesperson Jamie Shea, sounding just like Martin Fitzwater eight years earlier.The US-led war in Afghanistan has also been marked by a high level of 'collateral damage'."My brother is buried under here. What can we do? Our lives are ruined," said a distraught Mohammed Afzl as he surveyed the rubble following the US strike Again, the US tried to blame others - questioning whether it had really been a wedding. It's a tradition to fire celebratory shots in the air at Pashtun weddings, but the US claimed this was "hostile fire," so it was ok to bomb. Later, President Bush expressed his 'sympathy' to the mourning families and his 'hope that such kind of accidents won't happen again'. But of course they did, with great regularity.Dating back to Amiriyah, we can discern a clear pattern when 'collateral damage' occurs:a) The hit is described as a 'tragic mistake/accident', made because we were fighting 'the bad guys' (indirectly blaming the 'bad guys' for forcing us to be there).Or...b) The hit is blamed on the 'bad guys' directly., not Israel's, in the same way that every death during the NATO bombing of Yugoslavia was the fault of Milosevic.c) If there is a real outcry, then it's a case of: don't worry, we will hold our own internal inquiry! An internal inquiry which of course ends up exonerating the perpetrators.What we don't get and what the families of those killed in Amiriyah are still waiting for is justice.So spare a thought for the 408 today and all the other innocent victims of 'collateral damage', because we're really meant to have forgotten them.


sputnik--2019-06-17--Militant Fire in Syrias Aleppo Kills 11 Civilians - Russian MoD

Militant Fire in Syria's Aleppo Kills 11 Civilians - Russian MoD

“The Kudehi settlement in Aleppo province was subjected to mortar fire from the positions of militants of the Hayat Tahrir al-Sham terrorist group [former Jabhat al-Nusra, banned in Russia]... As a result of the shelling, 11 civilians were killed and 15 wounded," Bakin said.  Earlier in the day it was reported that 12 people were killed and 15 injured following an attack against a village in the Syrian province of Aleppo. At the time, a source in the local police force said that the attack killed a Syrian serviceman and injured several women and children. The attack also caused significant property damage.  Syria has been mired in a civil war since 2011, with government forces fighting numerous opposition groups as well as militant and terrorist organizations.  In late April, terrorists increased attacks on the Syrian provinces of Hama, Aleppo and Latakia, also attempting to attack Syrian army positions in the region. Government forces responded by intensifying attacks on the terrorists remaining in Idlib. Last week, Russia initiated an agreement on the full cessation of hostilities in the Idlib de-escalation zone.  *Nusra Front, Hayat Tahrir al-Sham are terrorist groups banned in Russia and many other countries.


sputnik--2019-09-21--Criminal Carelessness US Airstrikes Kill Afghan Civilians Cause Destruction of Society

‘Criminal Carelessness’: US Airstrikes Kill Afghan Civilians, Cause ‘Destruction of Society’

“One of the things that’s heartbreaking about this - these are pine nut farmers,”Terrell told host Brian Becker.  “I [have] visited Afghanistan, and especially my young friends there, just like young people in our cities, it’s: ‘How do I make legitimate living?’ And while the war in Afghanistan these last 18 years has destroyed any legitimate economy, any industry, any agriculture, the one thing that has been able to flourish has been the opium trade. And how are people to make a living if pine farmers are in danger? It’s horrible.”  The attack, which was targeting a Daesh hideout, instead took the lives of civilian farmers who were collecting pine nuts in Wazir Tangi in Afghanistan's Nangarhar province, Reuters reported.  "Initial indications are members of Daesh were among those targeted in the strike," Colonel Sonny Leggett, a spokesperson for the US-led coalition in Afghanistan is quoted as saying by Al-Jazeera. "However, we are working with local officials to determine whether there was collateral damage."  The latest attack against civilians in Afghanistan is not an isolated incident, Terrell explained.  “This [has] happened over and over again. [Former US President Barack] Obama insisted the drone strikes happen when we face an imminent threat and only when there is near certainty of no civilian casualties. This is what they’ve said over and over again. It’s the same policies that have been going on for 18 years. It’s carelessness; it’s criminal carelessness. Often the media will express it as a failed attempt at nation building, and it’s not at all. It's been [the] very destruction of a society, and Americans have to realize that and come to terms with just exactly what we've done to Afghanistan and what we are continuing to do,” Terrell explained.  A United Nations report published last month found that US airstrikes were responsible for more deaths of Afghan civilians than Taliban attacks were.  “That was a crime most likely perpetrated from American soil … The admission that there was civilian casualties only comes when there’s tremendous pressure … [The Afghanistan war is an] attack on a people, and it should stop, and there should be reparations,” Terrell added.  Afghanistan has long been in a state of political turmoil, with the government unable to establish full control over the country's territory due to various terrorist factions, in particular the Taliban and Daesh. In 2017, with Afghanistan’s armed forces struggling to respond to terrorist attacks within the country, US President Donald Trump announced a resolution to send more troops to the war-torn state, while also appealing to NATO members to assist by deploying more of their service members to the war zone.  The Taliban and the US were trying to reach a peace deal that would include the withdrawal of foreign troops from Afghanistan and assurances from the Taliban that the country will not be used as a safe haven for terrorists. The US has long insisted that the Afghan government take part in the peace negotiations, but the Taliban considers the government a puppet of the US, and has repeatedly stated that it is the only stakeholder in Afghanistan that will deal with the US. However, earlier this month, Trump declared that the US peace talks with Taliban “are dead” after the group claimed responsibility for a car bomb explosion in Kabul that killed dozens of people, including an American soldier.  The views and opinions expressed in the article do not necessarily reflect those of Sputnik.


sputnik--2019-10-09--At Least 30 Civilians Dead in US Strikes on Afghan Meth Labs, UN Says

At least 30 civilian were killed in US airstrikes on several drug-making facilities in Afghanistan in May, the United Nations Assistance Mission in Afghanistan (UNAMA) said in a report on Wednesday.  UNAMA claimed that they had “verified 39 civilian casualties (30 deaths, five injured and four undetermined), including 14 children and one woman, due to the 5 May airstrikes”.  The agency also said that they had obtained “credible information” about an additional 30 deaths, mostly women and children, and that they trying to verify the claims.  UNAMA argued that the methamphetamine production facilities were owned and operated by criminal groups, which is why they “did not meet the definition of legitimate military objectives under international law”.  The agency concluded that the factories and workers inside “may not be lawfully made the target of attack based on their possible economic or financial contribution to the war effort of a party to a conflict”.  US Forces-Afghanistan (USFOR-A) immediately rejected the UNAMA findings, insisting in a statement that the “precision” strikes had accurately targeted meth labs. USFOR-A also lambasted the UN agency’s “narrow definition” of legitimate targets.  “In addition to imagery collection during the precision strikes, USFOR-A conducted exhaustive assessments of the facilities and surrounding areas after the strikes. Combined assessments determined the strikes did not cause deaths or injuries to non-combatants,” the statement pointed out.  USFOR-A insisted the meth labs were run and owned by the Taliban, who they claimed used the revenue to "fund ongoing indiscriminate violence against innocent Afghans".  The May 5 raids in Farah and Nimroz province were carried out after “comprehensive intelligence confirmed that all personnel inside of the laboratories were Taliban combatants”, the command argued.  The US military focused on undermining the Taliban’s meth industry after multiple strikes against the militant group’s opium processing plants in 2017 and early 2018 failed to damage the insurgents’ revenue flow.  According to UN statistics, roughly 16,000 civilians have been killed in the Afghanistan war since 2009.  In August, the UN claimed in a report that the US and its allies in Afghanistan have been responsible for more civilian deaths in the country than the Taliban. At least 3,812 civilians have been killed or wounded in the first half of 2019, the report said, noting a big increase in the number of casualties caused by government and NATO-led troops.  The US and its allies launched a military operation in Afghanistan in 2001 after the 9/11 attacks, which were staged by the al-Qaeda* terror group, backed by then Taliban-led government of Afghanistan.  The Taliban and the US are trying to reach a peace deal that would include the withdrawal of foreign troops from Afghanistan and assurances from the Taliban that the country will not be used as a safe haven for terrorists.


tass--2019-10-18--At least 13 civilians killed by Turkish air strike against refugee convoy in Syria — TV

MOSCOW, October 18. /TASS/. Turkish warplanes on Friday attacked a convoy of refugees on the Tell-Tamer - Ayn Issa road in northern Syria, the Al Mayadeen television network reports. The strike reportedly left 13 killed and injured 70 others.  The Syrian SANA news agency earlier reported that Turkish jets killed five civilians and wounded 20 more in an attack on Umm al-Heyr community. Reports on more injuries are also coming from the district of Zerkan situated east of Ras al-Ayn town also struck by Turkish Air Force. At least eight people were injured there.  On Friday, the Kurdish Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF) accused the Turkish Armed Forces of carrying out attacks on civilians in the town of Ras al-Ayn in northeast Syria. "Despite the agreement to halt the fighting, [Turkish] air and artillery attacks continue to target the positions of fighters [and] civilian settlements [in Ras al-Ayn]," a Kurdish representative said in a statement.  On Thursday, the United States and Turkey reached an agreement to pause the Peace Spring operation. Turkey consented to a 120-hour ceasefire so that Kurdish units making up the coalition of the Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF) could leave the areas of the border security zone that Ankara is attempting to create. Turkey designates a terrorist status to many Kurdish organizations. If Kurds leave the area, the Turkish Armed Forces' operation will be ceased pursuant to the agreement reached by Ankara and Washington.


theindependent--2019-10-11--Under the bombs: The first days of Turkey's 'safe zone' have been anything but for ci

Under the bombs: The first days of Turkey's 'safe zone' have been anything but for civilians trapped in northeast Syria

When the bombing started, Azad Murad was away from his family. He learned that his home town of Qamishli was being shelled when he received a panicked phone call from his wife.  “She was crying. She didn’t know what was happening and she told me to come home now,” he said. He felt helpless, even more so when he heard his children crying in the background.  “I didn’t know what to do. It was the most difficult moment,” he told The Independent.  It was the same for thousands of residents of border towns and villages in northeast Syria this week, when Turkey launched a long-threatened attack against Kurdish forces in the area.  More than 100,000 people have fled their homes in the first three days of the operation, many without any idea of where they will go. At least 15 civilians have been killed, among them three children. Aid agencies said that vital services have been interrupted, including medical facilities and water supplies.  The conflict has been years in the making, but the scale and speed with which Turkey launched its attack appears to have taken many by surprise. The offensive was set into motion when Donald Trump unexpectedly gave Turkey the green light to attack the Kurdish-led Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF), effectively abandoning a key US ally.  The SDF worked closely with the US military in the years-long fight against Isis in Syria, acting as the main fighting force on the ground while US jets supported them from the air. It lost 12,000 fighters in the battle to defeat the Isis caliphate.  That alliance had infuriated Ankara, which considers the group a terrorist organisation for its links to separatists inside Turkey. Turkey says its operation is aimed at creating a “safe zone” some 20 miles deep all along the border, free of Kurdish forces.  But the campaign, the stated aim of which is to bring “stability” to Turkey’s southern border, has turned a once relatively peaceful part of Syria into a warzone once more.  In the time since the bombing began, Mr Murad has been sheltering with his wife, three children and elderly parents inside their house. Most shops are closed in the multi-ethnic city of Qamishli, home to 250,000 people.  “I’m playing music for my children when we hear shelling. This is the only option we have,” he said.  Mr Murad has reason to worry. Video released from a hospital in Qamishli on Thursday showed the chaotic scene as two children hit by artillery fire were rushed into the emergency room. Mohamed, 15, was killed by the attack. His sister, 8, whose foot was shown dangling from her shattered leg by just a thread, later had her limb amputated.  “Everyone was yelling and screaming in the hospital. The children’s aunt was crying, begging people to share blood, they needed a rare B-type for the little girl,” said Sharine, a resident of the city who went to the hospital to help.  “The doctors tried to reassure the aunt but in the last second they had to admit the little girl would lose her leg. Everyone looked horrified,” she told The Independent.  On Friday, the once bustling city was hit by more intense artillery. In the afternoon, a suspected car bomb struck a police headquarters in the city, sending plumes of smoke rising into the air.  Turkish artillery and jets have targeted towns and villages all the way along the border, but much of the ground fighting has been focused on the towns of Ras al-Ayn and Tal Abyad. Residents there were given little warning before Turkish jets screeched across the sky on Wednesday to begin their attack. Thousands piled into cars and jumped into the back of pick-up trucks in fear of the fighting.  “We left in large numbers sharing cars, while we were under fire. People were terrified of the Turkish factions,” said Sara, who fled Tal Abyad for the city of Kobani.  Hundreds of civilians reportedly turned up at the gates of a US base near Kobani demanding protection. Many who have been forced to flee their homes expressed surprise that the US, which one not long ago patrolled the border area alongside the SDF, had abandoned them.  “We are in shock. How, after all the resistance and eliminating Isis, could this happen to us? We were once the safest city now most of the people have fled and only a few are left in town,” she said.  “The children are suffering terribly,” she added. “Before I left, I saw a six-year-old boy crying and asked his mother am I going to die?”  The scale of the initial displacement has taken aid groups by surprise, but the worst may be yet to come. Some 450,000 people live within 3 miles of the border, where Turkey hopes to introduce its safe zone. The International Rescue Committee predicts that the new hostilities will displace 300,000 more in the immediate future.  That movement of people will likely create another crisis in a region already struggling. At least 700,000 of the 1.7 million people in northeast Syria need humanitarian assistance, according to the UN. Many local staff working for aid agencies have fled to safety with their families.  In the absence of an organised aid effort, families are finding shelter where they can. Fawaz Saydo, a teacher from the town of Tel Tamer, opened up the doors of the school where he works to people fleeing towns further north.  “We have put people in schools and houses as much as possible, but there is not enough space. People have gone down themselves to the streets to take people into their homes. There is no food relief or medical relief reaching us,” he told The Independent.  “Civilian areas not just military posts are being targeted,” he added. “A water point that supplied the whole of Hasakah was hit by the Turkish forces, so now Hasakah has been without water. There have been attempts to fix the water supply but we currently have no water.”  The chaos of the first three days of the offensive is likely to pale in comparison to what comes next. Amnesty International warned Friday that the Turkish offensive could spark a devastating humanitarian catastrophe.  “Hostilities will impact and restrict access to humanitarian aid, pushing the civilian population – which has already suffered years of violence and displacement – to the brink,” said Marie Struthers, Amnesty International’s Europe director.  The rights group said it documented indiscriminate attacks committed by the Turkish military and allied armed groups, and to a lesser extent Kurdish forces, the last time Turkey launched an operation against the SDF in the towns of Afrin and Azaz in northern Aleppo. It said scores of civilians were killed in the fighting.  The chaos of the past few days is now giving way to fear of what comes next. Mr Murad and tens of thousands of others are now figuring out what to do.  “Yesterday we were all discussing what options we have,” he says. None of them are good.  “To flee to Turkey? To Kurdistan region of Iraq? To the countryside? And what if I am forced to fight? Or if I choose to fight defend the region?  “I don’t know what to do. I have kids. I have an old father and mother to take care of them.”  Many reserve a special anger for Mr Trump – who not long ago was a popular figure in this part of the world.  “People call him a crazy person who cares only for money. And a big liar,” said Mr Murad. “The US left the people to their dark destiny.”


dailybuzzlive--2019-12-13--Female bodybuilder, 82, clobbers intruder

ROCHESTER, N.Y. (AP) — An intruder didn’t count on an 82-year-old woman living alone being an award-winning bodybuilder with nerves of steel.  Willie Murphy was getting ready for bed one night late last month at her home in Rochester, New York, when a man pounded on the door and said he needed an ambulance, Murphy told radio station WHAM.  She called police but wouldn’t open the door. Then, she said, the man broke in and skulked through the dark house.  “He picked the wrong house to break into,” Murphy said.  First, she clobbered him with a table. Then she poured shampoo in his face and was beating him with a broom when police arrived.  “I was whaling on that man,” Murphy told the Rochester Democrat and Chronicle. “‘Cause I said to myself, ‘If it’s my time to go to hell, I’m taking him with me!'”  The man got his ambulance ride, after all. He was sent to a hospital, and police tweeted a selfie with Murphy, calling her “tough as nails.”  Murphy works out almost daily at Rochester’s Maplewood YMCA and said she can deadlift 225 pounds — more than twice her weight. She can do one-handed pullups and one-handed pushups. She won the World Natural Powerlifting Federation Lifter of the Year award in 2014.  “She really helps dispel the myths of aging,” said Michelle LeBoo, a program coordinator at the Maplewood YMCA.  Murphy is “a strong, beautiful woman” who does things “for the benefit of others,” LeBoo added.  Murphy said she hopes her story inspires people of all ages.


drudgereport--2019-11-27--82-Year-Old Bodybuilding Grandma Takes Down Burglar...

— An 82-year-old female bodybuilder fought back against a man who broke through the door into her home, holding him down until police officers arrived.  Willie Murphy of Rochester, New York, said she was getting ready for bed Thursday just after 11 p.m. when a man began pounding on her door, urging her to call an ambulance for him, WHAM reported.  “He was outside and saying, ‘Please call an ambulance,’ saying, ‘I’m sick, I’m sick,'” she said.  Murphy said she called the police, but the man became angry and broke through the door.  “It’s kind of semi-dark and I’m alone, and I’m old. But guess what, I’m tough,” she said, baring her muscular arms.  What the suspect likely didn’t realize is Murphy is an award-winning bodybuilder who works out at the YMCA almost every day. The athletic grandmother can deadlift 225 pounds.  Murphy says she hid as the suspect walked through her house. At some point, she grabbed a nearby table.  “I took that table and I went to working on him,” she said. “And guess what? The table broke.”  The man fell to the floor.  “And when he’s down,” she continued, “I’m jumping on him.”  Murphy says once the suspect was down, she ran and grabbed a bottle of shampoo and squirted it on the man’s face as he tried to get up. Next, she started whacking him with a broom.  “He picked the wrong house to break into,” Murphy said.  “So they come in,” she said. “He’s laying down already because I had really did a number on that man.”  The 28-year-old suspect, who police say was intoxicated, was taken to a nearby hospital.  Murphy says she does not plan to press charges.


hotair--2019-11-18--There's a bodybuilding and powerlifting competition just for trans athletes

Virtually every time we’ve brought up the subject of transgender athletes in competitive sports here, the news has been less than good. For the most part, the stories inevitably wind up dealing with males “transitioning” to females who compete against actual women and wind up dominating the sport. Unfortunately, a solution to this issue that satisfies all parties has remained elusive to say the least.  But in at least two sports, some people are moving into a new field of gender categorization that could offer an answer. The sports are bodybuilding and powerlifting, and a group in Georgia has been hosting competitive events specific to transgender athletes. We’ll get back to why this is important in a moment. This tale begins with Josey Lynn Davis, a transgender bodybuilder who was looking for opportunities to compete after the entire “transition” process. (NY Post)  “I didn’t know what would be said about me, so I was scared,” Davis, who lives near Knoxville, Tenn., tells The Post. But after a bit of Google searching, she found an organization where she would feel comfortable showing her stuff: the International Association of Trans Bodybuilders and Powerlifters (IATBP), an organization that puts on a competition every October in Atlanta. Not only was Davis the first trans woman to compete, but she also won first place in the women’s bikini division.  The organization in question is the International Association of Trans Bodybuilders and they are hosting competitive events in both bodybuilding and powerlifting. (I should issue a trigger warning for those who require such things. That link has a lot of photos.)  This may seem well off the beaten path, but here’s why I wanted to point this out. We’ve already seen serious problems in competitive powerlifting where transgender athletes are winning medals and shutting out actual females in women’s events. But if the organizations running these competitions feel forced to accept transgender athletes, real females are eventually just going to be shut out.  Perhaps what the IATBP is doing here could provide a template. Granted, this only applies to two sports so far, but as long as the rules are made clear up front they could at least clear up the issue for weightlifters and other sports could follow suit. That way, everyone gets to compete but the unfairness factor is removed and competitive women’s sports can remain purely for naturally born women.  It’s a problem that most in the media are not willing to tackle thus far, unfortunately. Take for example this recent article from Wired. Titled, “The Trans athlete revolution is here,” it celebrates the “amazing victories” by trans athletes in female sports.  Transgender athletes are having a moment. At all levels of sport, they’re stepping onto the podium and into the headlines. New Zealand weightlifter Laurel Hubbard won two gold medals at the Pacific Games, and college senior CeCé Telfer became the NCAA Division II national champion in the 400-meter run. Another senior, June Eastwood, has been instrumental to her cross-country team’s success. At the high school level, Terry Miller won the girls’ 200-meter dash at Connecticut’s state open championship track meet. These recent performances are inherently praiseworthy—shining examples of what humans can accomplish with training and effort. But as more transgender athletes rise to the top of their fields, some vocal opponents are also expressing outrage at what they see as transgender athletes ruining sports for cisgendered girls and women.  To be fair to the author, the Wired article does go into the questions we’ve been addressing here about testosterone suppression and all the rest, as well as the debate over allowing transgender athletes to compete against women in the first place. But as the author notes, there have been few promising solutions offered. This idea of a third division in all sports doesn’t seem to be popular with everyone, however. They quote one athlete who says, “I don’t want to compete in a third category, which many people would see as a freak category.”  It may not satisfy everyone, but simply running up the white flag and allowing competitive women’s sports to be essentially destroyed isn’t an acceptable solution either. Until we eventually get a ruling from the Supreme Court (assuming it ever arrives) on definitions of sex and gender and the boundaries of what qualifies as a mental health issue versus some new warping of medical science, these problems will remain with us. But at least when it comes to sports, a third division in all areas of competition where everyone can participate while preserving women’s sports might at least be a start.


sputnik--2019-11-18--‘Iranian Hulk’ Sajad Gharibi to Take Part in Bare Knuckle Fighting Championship

Internet sensation Sajad Gharibi, an extreme bodybuilder from Iran with an outrageously puffed-up physique, has joined the boxing fight club, according to MMA Fighting on Sunday. Gharibi, whose other nickname is “the Persian Hercules”, is set to debut next year, BKFC President David Feldman said.  “We’re going to do a show entitled ‘USA vs. Iran: World War III,’ ” Feldman said. “[Gharibi] is literally our biggest signing we’ve ever had.”  Gharibi gained fame in 2016 not only for his bizarre behemoth build but because he vowed to join the fight against terrorists in Syria. His Instagram, which has 458,000 followers, is the place where he shows off his muscles and lifts more than his own body weight.