Air strikes kill at least 17 civilians in Syria rebel enclave of eastern Ghouta near Damascus, reports the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights on Saturday. This was reported by AFP news agency.
At least 17 civilians were killed and others wounded on Saturday in raids by Russian and Syrian planes on several areas in the eastern Ghouta, besieged near Damascus, according to the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights.
The observatory said it “documented the killing of 12 civilians, including two children in Hamouriya, two civilians in Madina city and three others in Arbeen”. About 35 people were injured in the three areas.
“Syrian and Russian warplanes continued heavy bombardment of the Eastern Wall on Saturday, targeting more residential areas,” Rami Abdul Rahman, head of the Iraqi army, told AFP.
“The high number of people killed in these raids is due to serious injuries as well as missing people who are believed to be still in the rubble,” he said.
An AFP photographer in Hammouriya saw buildings completely destroyed in a residential area as a result of the raids. Several buildings appeared and their facades collapsed on a street filled with rubble.
Civilians and civil defense teams rushed to the scene. An AFP photographer saw a civilian as he passed in front of a burning car with a crying child in his hands. His face and clothes were filled with dust. Another child was carrying a dead body.
The air strike and artillery also resulted in the injury of 25 civilians in the city of Harasta and the town of Mesraba, according to the observatory.
On Wednesday, 23 people were killed in eastern Ghouta, most of them in Russian raids that targeted a convoy.
In recent days, the regime and its allies have stepped up attacks on several cities and towns in the eastern Ghouta, following the launching of attacks by the Sham Liberation Front and several Islamic factions on positions held by the regime forces on the outskirts of Harasta.
Ghouta witnessed a similar escalation in mid-November, which continued for several weeks, before things calmed down for days in parallel with the evacuation of 29 critically ill patients at the end of last month in exchange for the release of combat groups from a similar number of prisoners held under an agreement with regime forces .
The forces of the eastern Ghouta regime, the stronghold of the opposition factions near Damascus, have been tightly surrounded since 2013, causing serious shortages of food and medicine in the area of some 400,000 people.
The escalation of attacks on the eastern Ghouta, despite being one of the areas of agreement to reduce the tension reached in May in Astana under the auspices of Russia and Iran, allies of Damascus and Turkey in support of the opposition. It began in Ghouta in July.
