Aleppo: 1 Child dead, 15 Injured in Bombarding Southern Villages during September 2018

      A child killed and 15 others injured in Aleppo southern countryside by Syrian regular forces shelling, besides the death of two children by a cluster bomb explosion; the bomb was a remnant of a previous shelling carried out between the 3^rd and 10^th of September 2018, according to testimonies STJ has obtained.  

      Ibrahim al-Haj, the information officer in the Syrian Civil Defense Directorate of Aleppo, stated in an interview with STJ on September 11, 2018 that the Syrian regular forces stationed near Shaghidlah Dam, shelled Birnah town randomly on September 10, 2018, killing a girl child; Marwa Shlash, and seriously injuring another.

The girl child Marwa Shlash, killed by the Syrian regular forces’ artillery shells on September 10, 2018, in al- Zerbeh village, Aleppo.
Photo credit: the media office in al- Zerbeh.

      The Syrian regular forces target the villages of the southern countryside with heavy artillery shelling. In the last few days, the shelling affected the areas of Jazraya, Uthmaniyah, Hweir al-Eas, Tell Bajer, Birnah, Zitan and Khalsah, injuring 15 persons with wounds of varying degrees, al-Haj added.

      The Syrian regular forces’ shelling on Aleppo southern countryside spread over many days during September 2018; on the 3^rd, towns of Jazraya, Zammar, and Uthmaniyah, shelled by artillery stationed in Tell Alloush. On the 6^th and 7^th, Jazraya was targeted with mortar shells. While artillery shells targeted Jazraya, Khalsah, Khan Toman, Birnah, Zitan, Mosherfa, on the 8^th, Jazraya, Uthmaniyah, Mosherfa, and Darnah on the 10^th, and targeted Tell Bajer from forces stationed in Tal Mammo on the 11^th, according to al-Zerbeh village media center, run by local activists.

      Fawaz Juayeed, director of the media center in al-Zerbeh, stated to STJ in an interview on September 12, 2018, that the shelling mainly targeted both towns of Jazraya and Zammar near the conflict lines between the Syrian regular forces on one hand and the National Front for Liberation and Hayat Tahrir al-Sham (HTS) on the other hand, noting that People were residing the east section of both villages, 100 family in each, displaced recently after the shelling had intensified.  

      There were no civilians in Khalsah village, while only 30 families were in Zitan, given the majority of families have displaced to Talafeh and al-Jadidah villages due to the intensified random shelling on their towns close to conflict lines, Juayeed added. 

      On the other hand, the media center in al-Zerbeh documented the killing of two displaced children; Omar Hussein al-Hameed, 13, from Abysan village, and Issa Ibn Abdo, 10, from Kaddar village, as a result of a cluster bomb explosion, which was a remnant of a previous bombing, in al-Zerbeh on September 3, 2018.   

      The Syrian regular forces re-shelled Aleppo southern countryside after a short pause, in parallel with its military escalation against Hama northern countryside and Idlib southern countryside, since September 2018. STJ has already published detailed reports on these incidents. [1]

      Leaders of three Astana guarantors countries: Russia's Vladimir Putin, Turkey's Recep Tayyip Erdogan and Iran's Hassan Rouhani, in their Tehran summit, on September 7, 2018, took up the situation in Idlib de-escalation area and decided to address it in line with the spirit of cooperation that characterized the Astana format, as the final statement stated.[2]