Men gather around damage from shelling of town of Al-Bab in northwest Syria, February 2, 2022 (Anadolu)
UPDATE, FEB 7:
Activists and the White Helmets civil defense tell the story of one of the victims of last Wednesday’s shelling of Al-Bab in Aleppo Province.
Islam was supposed to return to school on Sunday for the second semester. Instead, she is in a coma fighting for her life.
Syria: most civilians reported wounded remain anonymous. But here is one face: small Islam is fighting to live (coma), critically injured by blind shelling on town of Al-Bab (NE. Aleppo) earlier this week. https://t.co/TYqcO7o90b pic.twitter.com/cQGfXQnVqm
— QalaatM (@QalaatM) February 6, 2022
UPDATE, FEB 3:
The White Helmets civil defense reports mass casualties from strikes on Al-Bab in Aleppo Province.
The rescuers said the shelling was from an area where both the US-supported, Kurdish-led Syrian Democratic Forces and Assad regime troops are present.
9 civilians were killed & 31 others were injured, including some in critical condition, by missile attacks fired from the regime and SDF controlled areas targeting the popular market of #Al_Bab city east of #Aleppo. The teams transported the injured and retrieved the dead bodies. pic.twitter.com/Vtzu2WKpIx
— The White Helmets (@SyriaCivilDef) February 2, 2022
ORIGINAL ENTRY, JAN 18:
One person has been killed and six wounded in the latest car bombing near Azaz in northwest Syria.
The blast was in a market hall in Sajo village, home to civilians displaced by the Assad regime, near the Turkish border. The explosive was placed in a car purportedly distributing bread.
No group has taken responsibility, but Turkish officials have blamed the Syrian Kurdish militia YPG. Kurdish outlets cite “chaos…amid the inability of the controlling Turkish-backed armed opposition groups to control security”.
#Syria: this is the kind of attacks N. #Aleppo countryside has to face. This morning an IED destroyed a vehicle distributing bread in a market in Sajo (#Azaz). One woman killed, multiple wounded. pic.twitter.com/n25wVk4mYX
— QalaatM (@QalaatM) January 17, 2021
Azaz has been recurrently bombed since Turkey and anti-Assad fighters took over much of the Kurdish canton of Afrin, also in the northwest, in early 2018.
On July 19, car bombs in Afrin and Azaz killed five people and wounded 98.
Turkey considers the YPG as part of the Turkish Kurdish insurgency PKK. However, the militia is the leading faction in the US-backed Syrian Democratic Forces, which removed the Islamic State from northeast Syria in operations between autumn 2015 and March 2019.
A civilian was killed, and 6 others were injured, after an IED explosion in a car transporting bread in #Sajoo market in #Aleppo countryside this morning. #WhiteHelmets worked to rescue the injured, extinguish the fires, and secure the area. pic.twitter.com/qUIGvuDRIi
— The White Helmets (@SyriaCivilDef) January 17, 2021