How this often happens: some hospitals treat soldiers on both sides of a conflict. So, the people on one side of the conflict don't like this so they bomb the hospital. This is how hospitals got bombed in Afghanistan too that hospitalized soldiers from both sides. It is local soldiers on the ground not U.S. or NATO soldiers doing this by the way. They relay information often to U.S. or NATO soldiers though who then sometimes bomb hospitals if they aren't checking map and geographical co-ordinates carefully enough to double check locals.
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BEIRUT, Lebanon — Rescue workers pulled children and other victims from the …
Airstrikes in Syria Killed and Hurt Dozens Near Hospital, Rescuers Say
Toddler Rescued After Idlib Attack
Two hospitals in Idlib, Syria, were
hit in aerial bombardments reportedly conducted by Syrian government
forces or their Russian allies.
By NATALIA V. OSIPOVA on Publish Date May 31, 2016.
Photo by Khalil Ashawi/Reuters.
Watch in Times Video »
BEIRUT,
Lebanon — Rescue workers pulled children and other victims from the
rubble of their homes in insurgent-held northern Syria on Tuesday
morning after the latest aerial bombardments killed dozens of people.
The
attacks in the cities of Idlib and Aleppo began Monday night, and,
witnesses said, they appeared to be airstrikes conducted by Syrian
government forces or their Russian allies. Rescue workers and
antigovernment activists said that more than 20 people had been killed,
with dozens more injured.
In
Idlib, eight strikes around the National Hospital destroyed several
buildings in a crowded area of the city; earlier, opposition activists
had said the hospital had been struck. The attacks disrupted services at
one of the area’s few remaining hospitals; in Aleppo, a hospital was
damaged.
Video posted online by anti-government activists showed rescuers from the Syria Civil Defense,
a Western-funded group also known as the White Helmets, working amid
rubble and half-destroyed buildings near the National Hospital. One
worker pulled a toddler from underneath broken slabs of concrete, still alive.
Another rescuer cradled a dead child, covered with gray dust, retrieved from the rubble after hours of digging. He explained to the camera that the child’s parents and siblings had also been found dead.
A
staff member for Save the Children was killed in the Idlib strikes
along with several other people while trying to rescue others trapped in
a building that had been destroyed, the organization said in a statement Tuesday.
The
group said that the attacks in Idlib and nearby Aleppo on Monday night
had the hallmarks of a “double tap” strike in which rescuers responding
to an attack are targeted in a second strike. The Save the Children
staff member, a 23-year-old man, was part of an emergency response team
who were training volunteer rescuers after an initial attack when they
were hit by another airstrike.
Hospitals
have been hit regularly during the five-year civil war in Syria —
sometimes several hospitals or clinics in a single day. Earlier this
spring, more than half a dozen medical facilities were attacked in about a week in the divided city of Aleppo.
Opposition
activists and international human rights groups have said that
hospitals appear to be deliberately targeted by government forces as a
way of punishing civilians in rebel-held areas. Most of the hospitals
have been hit by pro-government forces, according to Physicians for
Human Rights, a group that tracks the episodes.
The
Russian and Syrian governments have said that they are carrying out
attacks aimed at terrorists, and Russia has denied that its strikes have
caused civilian casualties, saying that they are aimed at the
Qaeda-affiliated Nusra Front and Islamic State militants. Opposition
groups have said the Russian strikes also target relatively moderate
rebel groups.
“The
Russian aviation hasn’t performed any combat tasks, moreover hasn’t
conducted any airstrikes in the province of Idlib,” the Russian Defense
Ministry spokesman, Maj. Gen. Igor Konashenkov, said Tuesday in a
statement quoted by The Associated Press.
The
latest barrage in Idlib came a day before a deadline that the United
States, Russia and other interested governments had set for themselves to deliver supplies by airdrop
to besieged areas even without permission from the Syrian government.
President Bashar al-Assad has blocked land delivery of aid to towns
besieged by his forces.
Now,
United Nations officials appear to be backing away from airdrops,
saying that the United Nations aid agency rules require permission from
the Syrian government — something that is unlikely to happen because
there is no reason to expect that the government would allow airdrops in
areas where it has prohibited land convoys.
Airdrops are more expensive and less reliable
than ground deliveries, but several have been carried out with
government permission to Deir al-Zour, which is under assault by Islamic
State militants.
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