BEIRUT (AP) – Airstrikes and rockets in northern Syria knocked out two medical centers dedicated to women Friday and killed at least 12, including two people in one of the health facilities, according to opposition activists, a charity group and a hospital manager.
Warplanes and artillery shelling also continued to pound the besieged rebel-held neighborhoods of the northern city of Aleppo as government troops pushed their way from the enclave’s northeastern district.
Shafak, a Turkey-based Syrian NGO that supports medical facilities in Syria, said their UN-sponsored gynecology and gender-based violence treatment and awareness center in Termanin village in the northern Idlib province was hit by four consecutive airstrikes Friday afternoon, killing two civilians who were in the building and injuring a gynecologist and a janitor in the facility.
The center, which receives about 35 patients a day and is the only such facility in the area, has been put out of service, Shafak said in a statement. The center’s ambulance, emergency room and operation rooms were badly damaged, said Assad al-Halabi, an advocacy manager in Shafak. Al-Halabi said one of the killed was accompanying a patient. The second killed has not yet been identified.
A video and photos released by Shafak showed extensive damage to the collapsed building, as well as a destroyed incubator and ambulance. The Syrian Civil Defense team in Idlib said their team was targeted with airstrikes while they were conducting a search and rescue mission at the hospital- with what has become known as “double tap” strikes. The group said none of its volunteers were injured.