IDLIB: Syrian government forces and Russia have stepped up the bombardment of northwest Syria, killing dozens of people, including children, and wounding hundreds of others, opposition leaders and emergency volunteers have said, at a time when Israel’s war on Gaza is holding the world’s attention.
Russian and Syrian attacks in October focused on cities and villages in the countryside of Idlib and Aleppo. This escalation resulted in the total deaths of 66 civilians, including 23 children and 13 women, and left more than 270 people injured, with 79 children and 47 women among the casualties, according to a Syrian volunteer emergency rescue group. While the pace of aerial and artillery bombardment in northwest Syria has decreased since the beginning of November, Syrian regime forces have shifted their attention to targeting civilian vehicles using guided missiles.
Syrian Civil Defence, also known as the White Helmets, said that from the beginning of the current year until November 8, their teams responded to 17 guided-missile attacks by regime forces. These attacks resulted in the deaths of four civilians, including a White Helmets volunteer, and injured 15 civilians, including two children. Idlib is the last province controlled by opposition fighters in Syria, governed by a ceasefire agreement between Turkey and Russia since March 5, 2020. However, this agreement is occasionally violated by Syrian government forces.
“The military escalation by al-Assad regime, the Russians, and the Iranians against civilians in northern Syria has not stopped for a single day, but it intensifies and weakens from time to time based on international, regional, and local circumstances,” said Mustafa al-Bakour, a leader in Syrian opposition factions in northwest Syria, referring to Syrian President Bashar al-Assad.
Al-Bakour told Al Jazeera that Russia and the Syrian regime exploited the world’s preoccupation with the war in Gaza to escalate in northwest Syria, aiming to exert pressure on Turkey and Syrian opposition factions regarding issues such as opening the international road between Syria and Turkey. — Aljazeera
