To raise awareness of the Assad regime’s latest horrifying massacres in the district of Douma in Rural Damascus, the Syrian Coalition’s media office and legal office, in collaboration with the Syrian Network for Human Rights, issued a report detailing the massacres titled “Bombing Marketplaces.” The report lists the names of 122 people killed in the regime’s aerial strikes on the town, including 11 children and two women. Approximately 485 more people were injured in the district that has been subjected to a suffocating siege since late 2013.
The report, prepared by the field researcher Majd Dalati, sheds light on the worsening humanitarian conditions in Douma, the largest district in the rebel-held eastern Ghouta. It documents a regime aerial attack using eight rockets that hit two marketplaces and a residential neighborhood.
Following the airstrikes, Dr. Dalati conducted several surgeries and communicated with the families of the victims, and took photos and videos to document details, including names, of all the victims.
“A group of nearly 30 people were rushed to the field hospital, among them were five children. One of the injured was breathing with great difficulty before he died. I could not offer him anything. Another one died while we were preparing him for surgery. I saw an injured man whose intestines were outside of his body, and another one whose foot was so badly injured that the doctors had to amputate it,” Dr Dalati recounted.
The airstrikes targeted purely civilian marketplaces void of any military or weapons depots neither during the attack or before. The timing of the attacks and the areas targeted clearly show that pro-regime forces sought to cause as many civilian casualties and destructions as possible.
They are also aimed at thwarting the establishment of any model of governance that serves as a substitute for the government of the Assad regime.
The report indicates that the Assad regime flagrantly violated UN Security Council Resolution 2139 that calls for stopping indiscriminate attacks on unarmed civilians. While the scale of the air strikes strongly suggests they were ordered by Assad himself, the report pointed out that Russia, Iran and Hezbollah are involved in these attacks as they supply the Assad regime with weapons, equipment and money.
The report calls on the UN Security Council to take additional measures to force the Assad regime stop the targeting of civilian areas, stressing the need to put pressure on Assad’s allies to stop supplying his regime with weapons and military advisors. It also calls for referring the Syrian file to the International Criminal Court, to hold perpetrators of war crimes accountable, and to expand the sanctions to include all participants of the Assad and Iranian regimes. (Source: Syrian Coalition)
