Turkey’s Syria Invasion Killed Hundreds of Civilians

At Least 2,500 Civilians Wounded Since August Invasion

by Jason Ditz,

In late August, Turkey invaded the Syrian border city of Jarabulus, an ISIS-held city along the Euphrates River. Since then, they’ve expanded their territory significantly inside the northern Aleppo Province, grabbing large amounts of ISIS territory with the backing of certain rebel groups.

Turkey has made much of “liberating” large amounts of territory from ISIS, and “neutralizing” large numbers of ISIS fighters. There’s a substantial toll on top of this, however, which never gets mentioned in Turkey’s military statements, the civilian casualties.

According to the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights, Turkey’s invasion has left at least 352 civilians dead across northern Syria, and at least 2,500 others wounded. This shorts no sign of slowing, and every indication from Turkish officials is that their plans are nowhere near completed.

Turkey has been attacking the city of al-Bab for over a month now, the last ISIS city of any size in Aleppo Province. They’ve indicated that after al-Bab, they intend to attack Manbij, an even bigger city held by the Kurds, and then invade the Raqqa Province further east.