{"id":1144,"date":"2013-02-26T00:00:00","date_gmt":"2013-02-26T00:00:00","guid":{"rendered":""},"modified":"-0001-11-30T00:00:00","modified_gmt":"-0001-11-30T00:00:00","slug":"","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/dchrs.org\/?p=1144","title":{"rendered":"Syria: Unlawful Missile Attacks Kill More Than 140, Recent Escalation of Tactic Threatens Civilians"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>February 26, 2013 <br \/>\n  (Kilis) \u2013 The <a href=\"http:\/\/www.hrw.org\/middle-eastn-africa\/syria\">Syrian<\/a> [2] government  launched at least four ballistic missiles that struck populated areas in the  city of Aleppo and a town in Aleppo governorate during the week of February 17,  2013. The attacks killed more than 141 people, including 71 children, and  caused immense physical destruction.<\/p>\n<p>\n  The extent of the damage from a single strike, the lack of  aircraft in the area at the time, and reports of ballistic missiles being  launched from a military base near Damascus overwhelmingly suggest that  government forces struck these areas with ballistic missiles. Human Rights  Watch visited the four attack sites, all in residential neighborhoods. Human  Rights Watch found no signs of any military targets in the vicinity of any of  the four sites, which would mean that the attacks were unlawful.<\/p>\n<p>&ldquo;I have visited many attack sites in Syria, but have never  seen such destruction,&rdquo; said Ole Solvang, emergencies researcher at Human  Rights Watch, who visited the sites. &ldquo;Just when you think things can&rsquo;t get any  worse, the Syrian government finds ways to escalate its killing tactics.&rdquo;<\/p>\n<p>Human Rights Watch compiled a list of those killed from  cemetery burial records, interviews with relatives and neighbors, and  information from the Aleppo media center and the Violations Documentation  Center, a network of local activists.<\/p>\n<p>Around midnight on February 18 a missile struck the Jabal  Badro neighborhood in Aleppo, killing at least 47 people, including 23  children. According to local residents, government forces started shelling the  attack site about 20 minutes after the missile struck, wounding several people.  Just before 6 p.m. on February 22, a missile struck the Tariq al-Bab  neighborhood in the eastern part of Aleppo, killing at least 13 people,  including eight children. Just minutes later, a missile struck the Ard al-Hamra  neighborhood close by, killing at least 78 people, including 38 children.<\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p>\n<iframe loading=\"lazy\" width=\"640\" height=\"360\" src=\"http:\/\/www.youtube.com\/embed\/AbA4zeVJZ-w\" frameborder=\"0\" allowfullscreen><\/iframe>\n<\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p>The three neighborhoods, all in the eastern part of Aleppo,  were controlled by the opposition. While opposition fighters move throughout  opposition controlled areas, there had been no ground fighting in these  neighborhoods for months, local residents said. The opposition military  headquarters known to Human Rights Watch are in other neighborhoods.<\/p>\n<p>\n  At the time of the attacks, many people who had initially  fled the fighting in August 2012 had returned to the area, as well as people  displaced from other parts of the Aleppo governorate. There is ongoing fighting  around Aleppo&rsquo;s international airport, south of the neighborhoods that were  struck, but local residents interviewed by Human Rights Watch at each of the  sites attacked said that there had been no bases for opposition fighters in the  vicinity and that opposition fighters had staged no attacks from these  neighborhoods. During its visit, Human Rights Watch confirmed that there was  active fighting close to the airport, but not in these neighborhoods.<\/p>\n<p>  The fourth missile attack documented by Human Rights Watch struck Tel Rifat, a  town in Aleppo countryside, around 9:30 p.m. on February 18, killing three  people, including two girls. While there has been no ground fighting in Tel  Rifat for months, Aleppo residents told Human Rights Watch that government  forces at a nearby airport under attack by the opposition have repeatedly  shelled the town, causing the majority of residents to flee. During previous  visits Human Rights Watch met with opposition commanders in Tel Rifat, but  never in the area that was struck. Local residents told Human Rights Watch that  no fighters had been there.<\/p>\n<p>  Human Rights Watch research indicates that at least 141 people, including 71  children, were killed in the four attacks. Human Rights Watch was not able to  establish the first name of six of the 141 documented casualties.<\/p>\n<p>  The total casualty number is probably higher, Human Rights Watch said. Since  many families left the areas after the attack and buried family members in  surrounding villages, the records are probably incomplete.<\/p>\n<p>  Relatives at the attack sites told Human Rights Watch that they continued to  search for people believed to be still buried under the rubble. During Human  Rights Watch&rsquo;s visit to the attack site in Ard al-Hamra on February 24, two  days after the attack, local residents found the body of a woman who had been  buried under the rubble. A family member told Human Rights Watch that they were  still looking for other members of her family.<br \/>\n  In each site, the attack had completely destroyed 15 to 20  houses and significantly damaged many more.<\/p>\n<p>  Human Rights Watch did not find weapons remnants at the attack sites, and so  was unable to identify the exact weapons used. However, a group of local  activists in the Damascus countryside reported on their Facebook page that they  had observed missiles being launched toward the north before three of the four  strikes.<\/p>\n<p>  At 9:38 p.m. on February 18, the local coordination council in Yabroud <a href=\"https:\/\/www.facebook.com\/Yabroud.Revolution?ref=stream\">posted<\/a> [3] on  its Facebook site that it had observed a &ldquo;scud missile&rdquo; in the sky over Yabroud  at 9:05 p.m., heading toward northern Syria. Witnesses in Tel Rifat told Human  Rights Watch that a missile hit the town around 9:30 p.m. on February 18.<\/p>\n<p>  Likewise, on February 22, the Yabroud coordination council <a href=\"https:\/\/www.facebook.com\/Yabroud.Revolution\/posts\/546049868749112\">reported<\/a> [4] that it had seen three &ldquo;scud missiles&rdquo; flying northward around 5:30 p.m.  Just before 6 p.m., the Yabroud council <a href=\"https:\/\/www.facebook.com\/Yabroud.Revolution\/posts\/546057295415036\">reported<\/a> [5] that missiles had hit Aleppo. Human Rights Watch has not documented any  warning of the attack that hit the Jabal Bardo neighborhood in Aleppo shortly  around midnight on February 18.<\/p>\n<p>  The level of destruction and witness statements describing a single explosion  at each site is consistent with the use of ballistic missiles. Witnesses also  told Human Rights Watch that they did not see or hear any airplanes before or  after the attack, which makes it unlikely that the attacks were airstrikes.<br \/>\n  Syria stockpiles several types of ballistic missiles according  to the authoritative publication&nbsp;Military Balance 2011&nbsp;by the  International Institute of Strategic Studies.<br \/>\n  A Syrian government official <a href=\"http:\/\/www.dailystar.com.lb\/News\/Middle-East\/2013\/Feb-25\/207853-syria-regime-denies-firing-scud-missiles-at-rebels-report.ashx#axzz2Lw8r5WTW\">denied<\/a> [6] that the authorities had used Scud-missiles against the opposition. <a href=\"http:\/\/www.youtube.com\/playlist?list=PLPC0Udeof3T7n60nL2ptkGgfjEztggeT9\">Several  videos<\/a> [7] from different dates posted on YouTube, however, show Syrian  military forces launching ballistic missiles. In addition, a weapon used in an  attack on Belioun in Jabal Zawiyeh in December, 2012, has been identified as a  Luna-M ballistic missile (also called FROG-7), <a href=\"http:\/\/brown-moses.blogspot.co.uk\/2013\/01\/video-and-picture-evidence-of-scud-type.html\">according  to identification marks<\/a> [8] on the remnants.<\/p>\n<p>  Syrian government forces used ballistic missiles for the first time in December  2012, the <em>New York Times<\/em> <a href=\"http:\/\/www.nytimes.com\/2012\/12\/13\/world\/middleeast\/syria-war-developments-assad.html?hp&amp;_r=1&amp;\">reported<\/a> [9]. Since then, activists have counted more than 30 attacks with such missiles  before the attacks documented in this report. Several of them have landed in  fields without causing any damage, they said. Activists in Yabroud have claimed  on their Facebook page that the government has launched the missiles from the  nearby al-Nasiriyeh air base, north of Damascus city. The Local Coordination Committees,  a network of opposition activists, have <a href=\"http:\/\/www.lccsyria.org\/10960\">accused<\/a> [10]&nbsp;the 155th Brigade based near Damascus of launching the  missiles.<br \/>\n  &ldquo;Using ballistic missiles against its own people is a new  low, even for this government,&rdquo; Solvang said. &ldquo;There was no sign of fighters or  their bases in these areas, only civilians, many of them children.&rdquo;<\/p>\n<p>\n  <strong>Statements by Witnesses to the  Attacks:<\/strong><br \/>\n  &ldquo;Mohammed,&rdquo; who lives in the Ard al-Hamra neighborhood in  Aleppo city that a missile hit on February 22, told Human Rights Watch:<br \/>\n  I was having evening tea last night [February 22] with my  brother as I used to every evening in his house. Just after I had left at 9:15  p.m. the sky was lit up by a tremendous flash and all air was sucked away. The  explosion was deafening. When I ran back, my brother&rsquo;s house was gone. We  managed to find my five young nieces and nephews, aged between 3 and 17 years  old. They were all dead under the rubble. We still have not found my brother.  When will somebody stop this madness?<br \/>\n  &ldquo;Mahmoud,&rdquo; who lives in the Ard al-Hamra neighborhood in  Aleppo city, told Human Rights Watch:\n  <\/p>\n<p>My sister and I were sleeping while my mother was cooking  when the missile struck. I woke up by something hitting me in the face. I  didn&rsquo;t understand what had happened. It was dark, and it was very hard to  breathe. I could speak with my sister, but we couldn&rsquo;t move because of all the  debris from our house that had collapsed. We just prayed and thought about our  family. After three hours they finally managed to get us out and take us to the  hospital. But it turned out that my mother and brother had died.<br \/>\n  &ldquo;Ahmad,&rdquo; who lives in the Tariq al-Bab neighborhood in  Aleppo city attacked on February 22, told Human Rights Watch:\n<\/p>\n<p>I was standing a couple of hundred meters away in the main  street when the explosion happened. My whole family was in our house. Other  relatives live in the surrounding houses. I ran to our house and started  searching through the rubble. My wife and our 7-month-old daughter died. The  rest of my family and relatives were just wounded. We found about 10 bodies in  the rubble.\n<\/p>\n<p>&ldquo;Abdullah,&rdquo; who lives in the Jabal Badro neighborhood in  Aleppo city, told Human Rights Watch:<br \/>\n  That was once my grandfather&rsquo;s house &#8211; next to those of my  two uncles. There is nothing left. My own house is over here and it is also  destroyed. 27 of my relatives are dead or badly wounded. I am alive because I  had left my house the minute before the tremendous, lightning blast. The regime  has not only killed or maimed my family, but everyone I know.<\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p><strong>Source URL:<\/strong> <a href=\"http:\/\/www.hrw.org\/news\/2013\/02\/26\/syria-unlawful-missile-attacks-kill-more-140\">http:\/\/www.hrw.org\/news\/2013\/02\/26\/syria-unlawful-missile-attacks-kill-more-140<\/a><br \/>\n  <strong>Links:<\/strong><br \/>\n  [1] http:\/\/www.hrw.org\/news\/2013\/02\/26\/syria-unlawful-missile-attacks-kill-more-140<br \/>\n  [2] http:\/\/www.hrw.org\/middle-eastn-africa\/syria<br \/>\n  [3] https:\/\/www.facebook.com\/Yabroud.Revolution?ref=stream<br \/>\n  [4] https:\/\/www.facebook.com\/Yabroud.Revolution\/posts\/546049868749112<br \/>\n  [5] https:\/\/www.facebook.com\/Yabroud.Revolution\/posts\/546057295415036<br \/>\n  [6]  http:\/\/www.dailystar.com.lb\/News\/Middle-East\/2013\/Feb-25\/207853-syria-regime-denies-firing-scud-missiles-at-rebels-report.ashx#axzz2Lw8r5WTW<br \/>\n  [7] http:\/\/www.youtube.com\/playlist?list=PLPC0Udeof3T7n60nL2ptkGgfjEztggeT9<br \/>\n  [8]  http:\/\/brown-moses.blogspot.co.uk\/2013\/01\/video-and-picture-evidence-of-scud-type.html<br \/>\n  [9]  http:\/\/www.nytimes.com\/2012\/12\/13\/world\/middleeast\/syria-war-developments-assad.html?hp&amp;amp;_r=1&amp;amp;<br \/>\n  [10] http:\/\/www.lccsyria.org\/10960<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>February 26, 2013 <br \/>\n  (Kilis) \u2013 The <a href=\"http:\/\/www.hrw.org\/middle-eastn-africa\/syria\">Syrian<\/a> [2] government  launched at least four ballistic missiles that struck populated areas in the  city of Aleppo and a town in Aleppo governorate during the week of February 17,  2013. The attacks killed more than 141 people, including 71 children, and  caused immense physical destruction.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":10,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-1144","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/dchrs.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1144","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/dchrs.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/dchrs.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dchrs.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/10"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dchrs.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=1144"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/dchrs.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1144\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/dchrs.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=1144"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dchrs.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=1144"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dchrs.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=1144"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}