At least 13 people, including six children, have now been reported killed during the United States’ special forces raid in Syria last Thursday. U.S. President Joe Biden said that the raid was targeted at ISIS leader Abu Ibrahim al-Hashimi al-Qurashi. President Biden reported that al-Qurashi was killed during the invasion. The operation came during an ongoing resurgence attempt by ISIS while the U.S. military has been facing setbacks elsewhere, according to AP News. While the U.S. is considering this a successful operation, free of U.S. casualties, the attack was not the first time the U.S. military has come under scrutiny for not doing more to protect innocent civilians from their drone strikes.

In all of its statements, the United States has described the raid as largely successful, despite conversations with residents and members of the U.S. Defense Department that display condemnation for the loss of civilian lives. A resident on the ground told Al Jazeera, “when the operation ended, we went to the area and saw a woman who apparently detonated an explosive vest, and inside the building, we saw some bodies, including that of a man and a child.” These deaths come after U.S. Defense Secretary Austin Lloyd issued a direct order, saying, “the protection of innocent civilians in the conduct of our operations remains vital to the ultimate success of our operations and as a significant strategic and moral imperative.” 

While the United States’ raid of Syria is certainly critical in its effort to clamp down on the emerging threat of ISIS’s violent activity in Syria and other territories, the claims to success on behalf of U.S. personnel should be heavily scrutinized as highly dismissive of the value of innocent human lives. The Pentagon’s failure to even acknowledge the casualties could be portrayed as blatant disregard for the lives of anyone who isn’t in the U.S. military, innocent or not. Seeing as the deaths on Thursday are part of an ongoing trend in U.S. military strikes in the Middle East, it may be time to call more attention to the issue and put more pressure on the military to rethink its targeting strategies. 

At the peak of its activities, the Islamic State controlled over 40,000 square miles in Syria and Iraq, according to AP News. Since its 2019 defeat that pushed many of its members underground, the group has slowly been reasserting itself in the two countries through military operations aimed at people holding ISIS detainees. In response, the U.S. military has used drones to seek out and kill top ISIS operatives — the latest Syrian raid occurred in 2019, targeting former ISIS leader Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi. The issue is not isolated to Syria, as the most recent drone strike in Afghanistan, targeting an operative planning an attack on Kabul International Airport, had similarly devastating effects on civilians. In November, the Pentagon released drone footage of the strike that killed ten family members, including seven children. According to Al Jazeera, the Pentagon finally admitted its error in November. 

According to a New York Times investigation that was released in December of last year, U.S. air wars in the Middle East have been marked by “deeply flawed intelligence” and “faulty targeting,” resulting in the deaths of more than 1,000 civilians in the last decade. The contents of this investigation seemingly contradict government records, of which “not a single record includes a finding of wrongdoing or disciplinary action,” reported the paper. The deaths of 13 Syrian civilians this past week are certainly a tragedy, yet it doesn’t come as a shock to those who have been closely monitoring the missteps of U.S. military air raids. Regardless of whether it is flawed intelligence or targeting, the U.S. government needs to be held accountable. Moving forward, there needs to be more transparency regarding any costly errors on their behalf so they can be corrected, and more importantly, so the lives of innocent families and children are protected.