Fresh US-led airstrike leaves five civilians dead in eastern Syria

At least five civilians have lost their lives when the US-led coalition purportedly fighting the Daesh Takfiri terrorist group carried out an airstrike against Syria’s eastern province of Dayr al-Zawr.

Local sources, requesting anonymity, told Syria’s official news agency SANA that the airborne assault targeted the village of al-Sousa. There were two children among the fallen victims.

Speaking at the United Nations Security Council (UNSC) meeting in New York City on Friday, Syrian Ambassador to the United Nations Bashar al-Ja'afari said the US-led coalition “is targeting anything in Syria but not terror groups.”

“We are surprised that the UN Special Envoy to Syria (Staffan de Mistura) has ignored the crimes of this coalition against Syrian people. The illegal US-led international coalition continues to perpetrate crimes in Syria, the last of which was in the villages of al-Sousa and al-Bubadran, where 62 civilians lost their lives,” the Syrian UN ambassador pointed out.

The US-led coalition has been conducting airstrikes against what are said to be Daesh targets inside Syria since September 2014 without any authorization from the Damascus government.

Daesh ousts US-backed SDF militants from their stronghold

Meanwhile, the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights (SOHR) said Daesh Takfiri terrorists have expelled US-backed militants from the so-called Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF) from their main holdout in Dayr al-Zawr province.

“In counterattacks since Friday to Sunday dawn, Daesh has taken back all positions to which the SDF had advanced inside the Hajin pocket,” the monitoring group’s chief Rami Abdel-Rahman said.

Unlike Daesh, “our forces don't know the area and can't move around in conditions of zero visibility,” an SDF commander, requesting not to be named, said.

The commander added, “Military reinforcements and heavy weapons have been sent to the front and some units will be replaced by more experienced ones.”

SS