Syria: Redoubled shooting on the city of Aleppo

“Our city and our people suffered intense pain, anguish and discomfort during the night when neighborhoods in the city were hit with rocket-propelled grenades, with a destructive capacity that we had never heard and seen before," described the press release from the Catholic and Orthodox bishops of Aleppo after fierce bombing hit the Christians in the days in which Easter was being celebrated in Syria according to the Julian Calendar. Indeed, ever since April 10, the western districts of Aleppo, including Souleimaniyeh that is mostly Christian, suffered a deluge of rockets from the rebels like nothing they had ever seen.

Published by the Vatican press agency Fides on April 15, the press release was addressed “to people of conscience” and begged for an end to the destructions and massacres: “Stop being a laboratory for experimenting weapons of a devastating war! We are tired! Close the doors of the sale of arms and stop the instruments of death and the supply of ammunition. We are tired!"

The same day, Marc Fromager, director of Aide à l’Eglise en Détresse (AED – Help to the Church in Distress), declared: “It is time to stop this double game! At this very moment, people are being killed in great numbers in Aleppo, the second largest city in Syria, and no one is reacting. Yet the bishops of Aleppo just sent out a real warning cry: this cannot continue!” In the face of this new genocide, he continued, “The reality is that Christians are disappearing under our very eyes. The Christians are not the only ones being targeted in this massacre taking place in Aleppo: all the inhabitants of the city are under attack. Are we going to let this population be massacred by the jihadists without saying anything or doing anything? Are we going to be accomplices in this horror? And afterwards? First there was Mosul, now there is Aleppo; what next? Europe? The battle front is coming closer.” So he asks for: “1 – an end to arming and financing the jihadists of north-east Syria, be they officially moderate or not. 2 – the immediate implementation of a cease-fire. 3 – massive international emergency help to save the population of Aleppo.”

The intense bombings on western Aleppo started after Idlib, to the west of Aleppo, was taken by Al-Qaida and his allies on March 28. “Galvanized by their victory at Idlib, the rebels now want to take Aleppo,” Fabrice Balanche, director of a group of research and study on the Mediterranean and the Middle East, explained to France 24. All the more so, he added, since they “benefit at present from a renewed support from Turkey and Saudi Arabia, and are using ultra-sophisticated weapons.” Situated on the Turkish border, the province of Idlib is mostly under the control of Al-Nosra. Since the fall of Idlib, all that is left under his control is the province’s great cities of Jisr al-Choughour and Ariha, a few small villages, the military airport of Abou Douhour, and five military bases.

(Sources: aed/fides/france24/afp – DICI no.314 April 24, 2015)

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