Atareb, Syria: Syrian army shelling killed an elderly woman and four of her children in the war-torn country’s northwest, rescue workers and a monitor said on Thursday.
The overnight bombardment targeted their house in Kfar Nuran, close to the front line in the last rebel stronghold in the western province of Aleppo.
“An elderly woman and four of her children were killed in shelling by regime forces on the outskirts of Kfar Nuran,” said the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights war monitor.
The White Helmets rescue group also said a house was hit, killing “five civilians from the same family, including three women,” and wounding another woman.
The group, which operates in rebel-held parts of Syria, said they were a family who had been displaced by fighting elsewhere in the country.
The bodies of the woman and her adult children, two daughters and two sons, were wrapped in white shrouds and taken to a location near the town of Atareb, an AFP correspondent said.
More than four million people live in rebel-held parts of northern and northwestern Syria.
The area targeted is close to the front line between government forces and Hayat Tahrir Al-Sham, a jihadist group that is led by the former Syrian branch of Al-Qaeda.
The HTS controls the last pocket of armed opposition in northeastern Syria, including a large part of Idlib province and land bordering the provinces of Aleppo, Hama and Latakia.
A cease-fire brokered by Russia and Turkiye was declared in Idlib after a government offensive in March 2020, but it has been repeatedly violated.
On Wednesday, a girl was killed and seven civilians wounded in government shelling of Sarmin, in the east of Idlib province, said the Observatory, a Britain-based group with a network of sources on the ground in Syria.
Civil war erupted in Syria after President Bashar Assad’s security forces crushed peaceful protests in 2011.
With backing from Iran and Russia, the Assad government has recaptured most of the territory it lost at the start of the conflict.
The war has killed more than 500,000 people and displaced millions.
Syria army shelling kills five civilians: sources
https://arab.news/cv6rv
Syria army shelling kills five civilians: sources
- More than four million people live in rebel-held parts of northern and northwestern Syria
- The war has killed more than 500,000 people and displaced millions
Family of Palestinian-American shot dead by Israeli settler demand accountability
- Relatives say Abu Siyam was among about 30 residents from the village of Mukhmas who confronted armed settlers attempting to steal goats from the community
LONDON: The family of a 19-year-old Palestinian-American man reportedly shot dead by an Israeli settler in the occupied West Bank have demanded accountability, amid mounting scrutiny over a surge in settler violence and a lack of prosecutions.
Nasrallah Abu Siyam, a US citizen born in Philadelphia, was killed near the city of Ramallah on Wednesday, becoming at least the sixth American citizen to die in incidents involving Israeli settlers or soldiers in the territory in the past two years.
Relatives say Abu Siyam was among about 30 residents from the village of Mukhmas who confronted armed settlers attempting to steal goats from the community. Witnesses said that stones were thrown by both sides before settlers opened fire, wounding at least three villagers.
Abu Siyam was struck and later died of his injuries.
Abdulhamid Siyam, the victim’s cousin, said the killing reflected a wider pattern of impunity.
“A young man of 19 shot and killed in cold blood, and no responsibility,” he told the BBC. “Impunity completely.”
The US State Department said that it was aware of the death of a US citizen and was “carefully monitoring the situation,” while the Trump administration said that it stood ready to provide consular assistance.
The Israeli embassy in Washington said the incident was under review and that an operational inquiry “must be completed as soon as possible.”
A spokesperson for the Israeli Defense Forces said troops were deployed to the scene and used “riot dispersal means to restore order,” adding that no IDF gunfire was reported.
The military confirmed that the incident remained under review and said that a continued presence would be maintained in the area to prevent further unrest.
Palestinians and human rights organizations say such reviews rarely lead to criminal accountability, arguing that Israeli authorities routinely fail to prosecute settlers accused of violence.
A US embassy spokesperson later said that Washington “condemns this violence,” as international concern continues to grow over conditions in the occupied West Bank.
Palestinians and human rights groups say Israeli authorities routinely fail to investigate or prosecute settlers accused of violence against civilians.
Those concerns were echoed this week by the UN, which warned that Israel’s actions in the occupied West Bank may amount to ethnic cleansing.
A UN human rights office report on Thursday said that Israeli settlement expansion, settler attacks and military operations have increasingly displaced Palestinian communities, with dozens of villages reportedly emptied since the start of the Gaza war.
The report also criticized Israeli military tactics in the northern West Bank, saying that they resembled warfare and led to mass displacement, while noting abuses by Palestinian security forces, including the use of unnecessary lethal force and the intimidation of critics.
Neither Israel’s foreign ministry nor the Palestinian Authority has commented on the findings.
