LATEST: 8 Lebanese Soldiers Killed in Clashes with Islamists Near Border

Only days after proclaiming success for “reconciliation” with the flight of hundreds of people from opposition-held parts of East Ghouta near Damascus, the Assad regime killed scores of civilians in bombing of the area.

The Local Coordinating Committees reported that 65 people were slain on Friday in the attacks in East Ghouta, with 93 casualties across the country.

Activists said 53 people died in Hamouriyah, northeast of Damascus, from a barrel-bomb strike after Friday prayers. Video showed graphic images of the aftermath:

State news agency SANA ignores the Hamouriyah mass killing this morning. Instead, it proclaims that “dozens of families from the Douma area…managed to escape areas under the control of armed terrorists groups and sought protection at military checkpoints”. The website claims 107 people were evacuated on Friday and more than 5,000 in the last week.

The apparent contradiction between “reconciling” with civilians and killing them can be explained: the regime is hoping that the fear of death from bombing, added to the protracted sieges that have restricted food and essential supplies, will lead civilians to see departure from the opposition areas as their only option.

The attacks are not limited to the territory, held since 2012 by the opposition, near Damascus. Earlier this week, a Syrian warplane killed at least 75 people in a sheep market in northeast Syria, and on Friday there were deadly attacks on Dael in Daraa Province in the south.

State media does not mention civilian casualties but claims instead, “Forty terrorists were killed in Ibta’ village and 30 others in Dael village in the southern province of Daraa, among them a leader in Jabhat al-Nusra terrorist organization.”

The wounded being treated in Dael:

Rescuing the wounded in the Damascus suburb of Saqba:

8 Lebanese Soldiers Killed in Clashes with Islamists Near Border

The Lebanese Army has announced the deaths of three more soldiers in clashes with Islamists near the Syrian border, bringing the total to eight since Friday.

See earlier update in Syria Daily, Jan 23: $20 “Monthly Compensation” To Deal With Economic Crisis

The Lebanese military has been fighting gunmen near Ras Baalbek in northeast Lebanon after an army surveillance post was attacked. It claimed that it had killed and wounded scores of the assailants, who have retreated to higher ground.

The clashes are the latest in the periodic fighting between Lebanese forces and gunmen from the Islamic State and Jabhat al-Nusra, who briefly occupied the town of Arsal last August and abducted more than 30 Lebanese security personnel.

Kafranbel’s Protest Message: “There is a Worldwide Will to Fail the Revolution”

Kafranbel, the iconic center of protest in northwest Syria with its banner, chiding the world for failing the Syrian revolution and keeping humanity ignorant:

State Media: 4 Civilians Killed in Damascus and Homs by Insurgent Mortar Fire and Shelling

State news agency SANA claims that three civilians were killed and 11 others wounded on Saturday by insurgent mortar fire on the al-Zablatani area of eastern Damascus, near opposition-held Jobar.

One person was killed by shelling of villages in northern Homs Province.