BEIRUT (AP) — Intensive bombings pummeled Syria’s rebel-held eastern neighborhoods of the city of Aleppo on Friday, residents and rescuers said, hitting an area housing several hospitals and sending the chief of a pediatrics clinic in a frantic search for a place to move his young patients.
Earlier Friday, airstrikes on a village in the rural Aleppo province killed seven members of the same family, including four children, opposition activists said.
The attacks mark the fourth day of renewed assault by Syrian government warplanes on eastern Aleppo districts, a rebel-held enclave of 275,000 people. The onslaught began with a Russian announcement of its own offensive on the northern rebel-controlled Idlib province and the central Homs province.
So far, more than 100 people have been killed across northern Syria since Tuesday.
A physician who identified himself as Dr. Hatem, the head of the only pediatric hospital remaining in besieged rebel-held part of Aleppo, said his facility in the al-Shaar neighborhood has been targeted once more on Friday, causing damages to its exterior. The hospital was also hit during a wave of airstrikes on the complex housing four hospitals on Wednesday.
“Now it is being bombed … I am sorry … I have to go to transfer the children” to a safe area, he said in a text message. He uses his first name fearing for his family’s safety.
