At least 43 civilians have been killed in intense Syrian government air strikes on a town in the suburbs of Damascus, a day after the reported execution of a Syrian air force pilot, a monitoring group has said.
Saturday’s overnight shelling on Jayrud, 60km northeast of the Syrian capital Damascus, killed at least five women and children, as well as two medical staff.
The UK-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said scores were also wounded in the strikes, as well as shelling from army posts in the area.
A rebel spokesman said the strikes appeared to be in revenge for the killing of a Syrian air force pilot who parachuted down near the town after his plane crashed on Friday.
“The strikes against civilians are in retaliation against the execution of the pilot by Nusra Front,” Said Seif al Qalamoni from the Free Syrian Army’s Shahid Ahmad Abdo brigade that operates in Jayrud alongside the al Qaeda’s Nusra Front and other groups, told Reuters news agency.
Anti-regime groups in Jayrud include Jaish al-Islam, Ahrar al-Sham and al-Qaeda affiliate al-Nusra Front.
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In a statement, the military had pledged that the killing of its pilot “will not go unpunished”.
Ahrar al-Sham said in an online statement on Saturday it was attacking nearby government positions “in response to warplanes shelling Jayrud”.
The Observatory said the raids marked the first bombardment of Jayrud in at least two years.
“Prominent figures in Jayrud have had a local truce with the regime for at least two years, and neither fired on each other,” Observatory head Rami Abdel Rahman told the AFP news agency.
The truce had made Jayrud a sanctuary for thousands of civilians fleeing heavy battles nearby.
Separately, two women and a child were killed on Saturday in regime shelling of the eastern rebel-held Sayf al-Dawla neighbourhood of Aleppo, north of Syria, the Observatory said.
It added that the toll in a Friday attack on the crowded market in the Tariq al-Bab district had risen to 17, including five children.
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