KUNDUZ, Afghanistan — Mohammad Anas, a college student, sheltered with friends and relatives in a mosque as they listened, terrified, to the boom of American airstrikes pummeling Taliban positions near their village in northern Afghanistan on Nov. 3.

When the bombing subsided the next morning, the villagers came out and tried to return home, but Taliban insurgents ordered them to begin recovering the bodies of slain fighters.

Before they finished, Mr. Anas said, warplanes returned and bombed the group. When it was over, village elders say, 19 civilians were left dead and at least six others were wounded — including Mr. Anas, whose wounds were minor.

“Three of my friends were dead,” he said.

The United Nations confirmed the broad outlines of Mr. Anas’s account, saying at least 10 civilians were killed in airstrikes on Nov. 4 in Kunduz Province. But the American military in Afghanistan insists that the only dead or wounded were Taliban insurgents.