Azmat Khan’s investigation demonstrates the importance of information the public about the impacts of American wars on civilians. By speaking directly to victims of airstrikes, like the Saad family, Khan and her team humanized the civilians harmed by the war and continued to experience trauma for years after the war disappeared from the frontlines of American consciousness and public discourse. Sharing the victims’ stories also shows that there are very specific examples of the contrast between the official government narrative in reality, which cannot be denied based on evidence from eyewitnesses and family members. For instance, Younes Mahmood Thanoun was a victim of a strike which was only supposed to target one car but hit three because of an intentional decision to save more precise and lower collateral weapons for future strikes. The Pentagon concluded that there was no evidence of wrongdoing in this instance.

One of the most obvious reflections on Khan’s investigation is the striking similarity between what happened in Iraq and what is happening now in Gaza in terms of the underestimation of civilian harm and the contrast between the official narrative and realities on the ground. This particular quote stood out to me: “The air war has been marked by deeply flawed intelligence, rushed and often imprecise targeting, and the deaths of thousands of civilians, many of them children, a sharp contrast to the American government’s image of war waged by all-seeing drones and precision bombs.” Khan’s work and stories of victims she was able to share demonstrate this reality for Iraq, but this quote can almost be pasted with little change into a story about Gaza. The State Department’s official narrative and regular press briefings emphasize that they are putting pressure to reduce civilian harm and that strikes are carried out with precision, with civilian deaths as an unintended side effect, but the numbers and reports coming out of Gaza suggest that this is inaccurate.

This piece also sheds some light on both the role and challenges of investigative journalism – the second part to the series mentioned that it took years of negotiation and FOIA requests to obtain certain documents and information, and that on the ground data collection was interrupted by the pandemic. I also know and follow Lila Hassan, one of the research assistants who contributed to this project, and she often shares on her platforms how difficult it is and how much persistence is required to get access to documents from government sources. It is necessary work to hold officials accountable and shed light on the hypocrisy between the public narrative and what actually happened, but the reality is that it can also take years for this accountability to take place. It was also insightful to learn about some of the measures Khan took while visiting 50 sites in Mosul to ensure that the information she receives is accurate and that prior notice does not bias the work.