At least five killed in attack on Syrian hospital

The shelling marks the first attack on an Aleppo hospital in over a year

(Anadolu Agency via Getty Images)

At least five civilians have been killed in a government attack on a hospital in northwest Syria, rescuers and activists say.

Artillery shells fired from government areas landed at the underground hospital’s entrance in the rebel-controlled town of Atarib in western Aleppo, according to the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights.

Syrian Civil Defence volunteers, known as the White Helmets, say that the ensuing explosion killed at least five, including a woman and a child, and wounded medical staff.

Rebel groups often build their medical facilities underground to avoid targeting in the conflict-prone area.

Footage of the incident posted to Facebook showed blood stains and debris at the hospital’s entrance.

Fadi Hakim, a spokesperson for the Syrian American Medical Society, which supports the hospital, said that 15 people were injured including five medical staff. He could only confirm four killed.

Mr Hakim added that the emergency room and orthopaedic clinic had been destroyed and that the hospital has been evacuated.

The health directorate of Syria’s rebel-controlled north west said that the attack was the first on a hospital in the region since February 2020.

US-based Physicians for Human Rights has recorded 598 attacks on 350 healthcare facilities since Syria’s civil war began in 2011. Most were allegedly committed by the government and its allied forces, including Russia.

The rights group also say that 930 medical staff members have been killed in the same period.

Syria’s government consider rebel-controlled areas to be run by terrorists.