CASUALTIES

This report is the latest in our series on Syria. 

Today’s report is in two parts:

1) NCF Casualty estimates and 

2) All other Casualty estimates. 

The second half of this latter report is so extensive that we have only included the summary here under the title “Casualties in more detail”. The full background by region of Syria can be accessed on the NCF Syria blog.

Casualties – The NCF casualty estimates

We have delayed the release of this report until this afternoon in order to include comprehensive casualty reports for the past week. We are releasing our figures weekly figures today (Tuesday afternoon) because it gives us time to analyse the data coming in over the weekend. We are going to give you our casualty estimates and then give you data from the other sources upon which they are based so that you can arrive at your own conclusions. The full background data upon which those other casualty estimates are based can be found on our Syria blog on this link. It is too copious to include in this report.

The NCF estimates based on all available sources are as follows. 

NCF note – we are doing our very best to give you the most accurate estimate available. We ourselves recognise that these figures may vary widely from the actual truth, which, to be honest, is known to none of us but God:

CIVILIAN CASUALTIES

(The LCC figure – minus the highest available rebel casualty figure)

Date	Civilian casualties
26/06	103
27/06	80
28/06	98
29/06	62
30/06	160
01/07	58
02/07	95
TOTAL	665

REBEL CASUALTIES

(Rebel casualty figures seem unrealistically low and as such the NCF has chosen the highest available figures for each day)

Date	Rebel casualties
26/06	10
27/06	15
28/06	39
29/06	7
30/06	14
01/07	10
02/07	12
TOTAL	107

GOVERNMENT CASUALTIES

(The NCF is aware that government casualties are massively under-reported. The Syrian Observatory for Human Rights is the only organisation that has remotely consistent figures for government casualties and we have used their figures though even SOHR stopped publishing casualty figures by region on Friday 29th – note that the government itself has stopped publishing its own casualty figures on SANA, issuing its last casualty figure for government dead on 26^th June)

Date	Government casualties
26/06	46
27/06	57
28/06	59
29/06	23
30/06	27
01/07	19
02/07	25
TOTAL	256

Weekly Casualty estimates

The number of rebel casualties has increased slightly during the past week. However the figures for government casualties and for civilian casualties have increased massively. Rebel casualties are lower because they tend to employ guerrilla tactics (and also possibly because they under-report their own dead):

Civilian dead:

665 dead this past week ending 2 July

373 dead last week ending 25 June  

350 dead the previous week ended 18 June  

105 dead the week ended 11 June  

Rebel dead:

107 dead this past week ended 2 July

77 dead last week ending 25 June

41 dead the previous week ended 18 June  

40 dead the week ended 11 June  

Government dead:

256 dead this past week ended 2 July

143 dead last week ending 25 June

53 dead the previous week ended 18 June  

92 dead the week ended 11 June  

And Another Perspective

The actual figures are, as we have stated, impossible to know and could be higher or equally could be lower than the above figures which represent the best calculation we can make from the available data. As just one example of the way in which reported casualty figures are inaccurate, reports for the total number of civilian dead in Aleppo province for Sunday 1^st July were: SOHR 6; VDC 8; SNHR 13; LCC 5. Not only are these figures at variance with one another, the NCF is aware that none of these casualty figures include the well publicised killing that Sunday of more than ten Kurds on a bus on the Aleppo / Azall road (reports of the number of dead in this one incident vary from 11 to 14). This attack was so well publicised that video of the incident was even placed on u-tube. Why are these deaths left out of the casualty lists? Because the Kurds don’t matter? Because they were killed by the rebels? Because this was an internecine killing by the PKK? Or just because of human error. It is hard to know. But clearly they have been excluded from the figures for the civilian dead. There are other similar instances we could list.

Casualties in more detail

The numbers of reported casualties follows in a table in which the source is given and a day by day breakdown of totals. For more detail including a breakdown of these figures by region go to our Syria blog on this link.

TOTAL CIVILIAN CASUALTIES

	SYRIAN OBSERVATORY FOR HUMAN RIGHTS	VIOLATIONS DOCUMENTING CENTRE	SYRIAN ARAB NEWS AGENCY	SYRIAN NETWORK FOR HUMAN RIGHTS	LOCAL COORDINATION COMMITTEES	SYRIAN SHUHADA (run one day ahead)
26/06	85	92	-	120	113	126
27/06	73	101	-	99	95	103
28/06	103	93	-	134	137	134
29/06	49	51	-	62	69	85
30/06	90	137	-	131	174	119
01/07	49	43	-	88	68	174
02/07	49	47	-	104	107	-

TOTAL REBEL CASUALTIES

	SYRIAN OBSERVATORY FOR HUMAN RIGHTS	VIOLATIONS DOCUMENTING CENTRE	SYRIAN ARAB NEWS AGENCY	SYRIAN NETWORK FOR HUMAN RIGHTS	LOCAL COORDINATION COMMITTEES	SYRIAN SHUHADA
26/06	4	7	10	-	-	4
27/06	15	4	4	-	-	2
28/06	19	20	39	-	-	9
29/06	6	7	-	-	-	1
30/06	11	14	3	-	-	13
01/07	10	10	7	-	-	-
02/07	9	12	4	-	-	-

TOTAL GOVERNMENT CASUALTIES

	SYRIAN OBSERVATORY FOR HUMAN RIGHTS	VIOLATIONS DOCUMENTING CENTRE	SYRIAN ARAB NEWS AGENCY	SYRIAN NETWORK FOR HUMAN RIGHTS	LOCAL COORDINATION COMMITTEES	SYRIAN SHUHADA
26/06	46	-	10	-	-	5
27/06	57	4	-	-	-	-
28/06	59	1	-	-	-	-
29/06	23	1	-	-	-	-
30/06	27	-	-	-	-	-
01/07	19	-	-	-	-	-
02/07	25	-	-	-	-	-

SANA has consistently low figures in all reported deaths, especially this week in which SANA has stopped reporting the numbers of government forces killed.

The LCC figures do not distinguish between civilians and rebel soldiers (lumping both groups together as “martyrs”). As the LCC is a local organisation on the ground in Syria, we have made a decision that for the present we will use their figures for NCF estimates of civilian dead (but first deducting our totals for rebel fighters killed).