Intense Syrian airstrikes and artillery fire against a shrinking number of towns and villages under rebel control in the Damascus suburb of Eastern Ghouta have been fueling a mounting number of casualties, including large numbers of civilians.
Indeed, this has been the deadliest weeksince 2015 for the region, with the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights reporting 229 people killed in just the past four days of strikes, including 43 women and 58 children.
The deadliest day of the week was Tuesday, where strikes killed upwards of 70 people. It’s unclear how many rebel fighters were killed all told in these strikes, but civilians seem to have borne the majority of the blows.
Which is common enough in Syria. Heavy airstrikes, no matter which air force is conducting them, seem throughout the war to hit densely populated residential areas, and rarely do more than superficial harm to enemy forces, while causing disastrous amounts of civilian casualties.