‘Over 20 killed’ in air strike in Syria

AAZAZ, Syria – At least 20 people, including children, were killed in a devastating air strike on a rebel bastion in northern Syria on Wednesday, activists and residents said.

An AFP correspondent said at least 10 houses had been flattened in the strike on the town of Aazaz which lies just to the north of the main battleground city Aleppo.

Syrian Observatory for Human Rights director Rami Abdel Rahman said more than 20 people were killed in the air strike.

Witnesses told AFP at the scene that at least five bodies had been pulled from the rubble and many more were still trapped.

“This was a civilian area. All these houses were packed with women and children sleeping during the fast,” said witness Abu Omar, a civil engineer in his 50s.

“Only dogs can do something like this. Israel wouldn’t do such a thing in a war,” he told AFP.

Aazaz lies just to the north of Syria’s commercial hub Aleppo near the border with Turkey and is often used as rear base by rebel Free Syrian Army fighters.

The attack came amid heavy shelling of several districts of Aleppo during the dawn-to-dusk fast which Muslims observer during the holy month of Ramadan.

The Britain-based Observatory said that the strike was by a MiG fighter jet and targeted a former Baath Party headquarters which had been taken over by rebel groups.

“The whole of the area was flattened,” Abdel Rahman said. “Those killed included civilians and fighters, but what is clear is that there was a Free Syrian Army base there.”

An AFP correspondent said dozens of people, many wailing and shouting, were climbing over the rubble, trying to pull out victims.

“That’s it, I’m leaving for Turkey with my family today. Life here is impossible,” said another witness who gave his name as Jomaa.

“If you come to the basement of my house now, there are 15 women who are afraid to go out. This is what Bashar does to us,” he said referring to embattled Syrian President Bashar al-Assad.

At the local hospital, people brought in the body of a little girl apparently aged no more than four, the AFP correspondent said.

Footage from an amateur video distributed by the Observatory also showed the immobile, dust-covered hand of a little girl, likely dead, reaching out from under ruined buildings.

Abdel Rahman said that among those wounded were four of a group of 11 Lebanese Shiite pilgrims who were kidnapped near Aazaz in May. – Agence-France Presse