A Nigerian Air Force airstrike targeting jihadist militants struck a bustling market in northeastern Nigeria on Saturday, killing more than 100 civilians including children in one of the deadliest military misfires in the country’s long-running battle against Islamic insurgents.
The strike hit Jilli market along the border between Borno and Yobe states as military aircraft hunted for members of Boko Haram and Islamic State West Africa Province operating in the region. Amnesty International and local officials confirmed the catastrophic civilian toll, with hospitals treating dozens of seriously wounded survivors. Local chief Lawan Zanna Nur Geidam told AFP that total casualties—dead and injured combined—reached approximately 200.
The Nigerian Air Force acknowledged the incident and dispatched its Civilian Harm Accident and Investigation Cell to Jilli on a fact-finding mission. Military officials confirmed they had conducted what they described as a precision strike on a known terrorist location but made no immediate mention of civilian casualties in their initial statement.
Many of the wounded were transported to hospitals in nearby Geidam and Maiduguri, where at least eight more victims died Sunday. A worker at Geidam General Hospital, speaking on condition of anonymity, said at least 23 people injured in the incident were receiving treatment. Medical facilities in the region—already stretched thin by years of insurgency-related casualties—struggled to cope with the influx of patients suffering from massive trauma, burns, and shrapnel wounds.
Ahmed Ali, a 43-year-old market trader who sells medical consumables, recounted the terrifying moments when the strike hit. “I became so scared and attempted to run away, but a friend dragged me and we all lay on the ground,” he told Reuters from hospital. Another survivor told the news agency he had been shopping for animals when approximately 30 people around him fell after being struck.
Isa Sanusi, Amnesty International’s Nigeria director, confirmed that children were among the dead. “We have their pictures and they include children,” Sanusi told the Associated Press. The human rights organization condemned the strike as unlawful and called for an independent investigation, adding that the military is “fond of” labeling civilian casualties as bandits or terrorists.
The Nigerian military defended the operation, saying it had conducted a carefully coordinated strike on what it described as a terrorist enclave and logistics hub near the abandoned village of Jilli. The military characterized the location as having been “long identified as a major terrorist movement corridor” used by Islamic State West Africa Province fighters and their collaborators, claiming scores of terrorists were killed as they rode motorcycles in the restricted area.
Security sources acknowledged that the Jilli market has long been frequented by Boko Haram militants seeking food supplies, complicating efforts to distinguish between civilians and insurgents. Abdulmumin Bulama, a member of a civilian security group working with the military, said intelligence indicated terrorists had gathered near the market and were planning attacks on nearby communities.
The Yobe state government confirmed that the airstrike had targeted a Boko Haram stronghold and acknowledged that “some people…who went to the Jilli weekly market were affected.” Brigadier General Dahiru Abdulsalam, military adviser to the Yobe state government, provided no further detail on the death toll. The Yobe State Emergency Management Agency dispatched response teams to assist with casualty evacuation and treatment.
Saturday’s tragedy marks the latest in a grim pattern of deadly misfires in northeastern Nigeria, where the military frequently conducts air raids against armed groups controlling remote forest enclaves. According to an Associated Press tally, such strikes have killed at least 500 civilians since 2017—a toll that security analysts attribute to persistent failures in intelligence gathering and insufficient coordination between ground troops and air assets.
Previous incidents have seen military airstrikes mistakenly hit villages, camps for displaced people, and other markets. In January 2017, at least 112 people died when a fighter jet struck a camp housing 40,000 displaced people near the Cameroon border. In December 2023, a military airstrike mistook a Muslim religious gathering for bandits in Kaduna state, killing at least 85 people.
The northeastern region has endured more than 17 years of jihadist insurgency since Boko Haram’s 2009 uprising, which spawned powerful splinter groups including Islamic State West Africa Province. The conflict has killed tens of thousands and displaced millions, creating a humanitarian crisis that continues to challenge Nigerian security forces and international aid organizations.
President Bola Ahmed Tinubu convened a security meeting with service chiefs and the Inspector-General of Police at the Presidential Villa in Abuja following the incident. The Nigerian Air Force has promised a thorough investigation, but Amnesty International and other human rights groups demand an independent inquiry into what went wrong at Jilli market.
The death toll may rise in coming days as some of the seriously wounded remain in critical condition. Local officials continue to compile lists of the dead and missing, while survivors grapple with injuries and the loss of family members in a region already devastated by years of conflict and instability.
