U.S. bombs kill political prisoners held by ISIS

(Image credit: Alan Radecki/U.S. Navy/Northrop Grumman via Getty Images)

An American airstrike in Syria last month reportedly killed more than 50 Syrian civilians who were being held by ISIS over alleged violations of Sharia law. Local eyewitnesses and a Syrian human rights organization say that the U.S. bombs took out an ISIS prison holding 55 to 61 political prisoners who were accused of crimes like wearing jeans and showing up late to prayer.

Though the Pentagon originally denied civilian casualties, this past weekend it acknowledged the attack and the reports of non-ISIS deaths. American airstrikes elsewhere in Syria have had dubious success, angering locals and shifting their sympathies toward ISIS.

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Bonnie Kristian

Bonnie Kristian was a deputy editor and acting editor-in-chief of TheWeek.com. She is a columnist at Christianity Today and author of Untrustworthy: The Knowledge Crisis Breaking Our Brains, Polluting Our Politics, and Corrupting Christian Community (forthcoming 2022) and A Flexible Faith: Rethinking What It Means to Follow Jesus Today (2018). Her writing has also appeared at Time Magazine, CNN, USA Today, Newsweek, the Los Angeles Times, and The American Conservative, among other outlets.