Civilians enduring intense bombardment in Syria’s rebel-held Eastern Ghouta say they are being assailed by a new kind of rocket that spreads potentially deadly fires.
The Syrian American Medical Society told CNN that 100 of the rockets had rained down in recent days, and that civil defense forces were struggling to put out the fires they caused.
Close to 400,000 people are living in deteriorating conditions in the Damascus suburb, which has been pounded with shells, mortars and bombs by Russian-backed Syrian regime forces since Sunday night. More than 300 people have been reported killed in the latest strikes.
The UN Security Council failed to vote Thursday on a draft resolution which called for a 30-day halt in the fighting to allow for critical aid deliveries and medical evacuations to the area. The United States accused Russia — the Syrian regime’s main ally — of blocking the measure.
The Security Council will meet again Friday to consider the temporary ceasefire, according to Kuwait, which currently holds the rotating Security Council presidency.
Pressed to describe what the US was doing to end the violence, the US State Department spokeswoman Heather Nauert expressed frustration with the media. “I don’t know what some of you expect us to do,” she exclaimed. Nauert insisted that the administration was “fully engaged” with the crisis.
Basel Termanini, Vice President of the Syrian American Medical Society told CNN that civilians in Eastern Ghouta, many of whom are sheltering from the bombardment in makeshift underground shelters, were now under threat from fires.
“People from inside Ghouta are reporting new rockets that are causing widespread fires which is a new development,” Termanini said. “More than 100 of those were launched today and the civil defense is unable to cope with the widespread fires. Fire is now the number one danger threatening civilians.”
After a years-long siege, food, water and drugs are in desperately short supply in Eastern Ghouta and injured civilians have little recourse to help. The Union of Medical Care and Relief Organizations said 26 medical facilities had been targeted by strikes between Monday and Thursday.
Syria says it is targeting terrorists in Eastern Ghouta. Rebel groups in the area have fired mortars into Damascus this week, causing dozens of deaths and injuries, state media report.
Russia has sought to lay the blame for the crisis at the door of the rebel groups, saying they have derailed talks to resolve the conflict and are preventing civilians from leaving the enclave.
Russia’s Ambassador to the United Nations Vassily Nebenzia, who argued against the UN draft resolution, claimed that there was a “mass psychosis by global media” over the situation in Eastern Ghouta, where monitoring groups, activist and international agencies report scenes of devastation.
Regime drops leaflets
The Syrian military said Syrian army helicopters dropped leaflets on Eastern Ghouta on Thursday, calling for residents to leave the area for their safety. A photograph of the leaflets was published on the Syrian military’s social media accounts.
The leaflets provide instructions on how to get safely out of Eastern Ghouta and warn that the area is surrounded by the Syrian army. The text calls for civilians “not to deal with the militants.”
Doctors and other residents inside Eastern Ghouta said they had not seen the leaflets by Thursday night. “We didn’t see this dropped,” Dr Hamza Hassan told a WhatsApp group created by SAMS. “Nobody out of basements today to see this dropped and this will be burned by fires and explosives.”
Hassan told CNN on Friday that he had seen images of the leaflets that were released by the Syrian military online, but that no one had seen the actual fliers.
A medical aid worker who spoke to CNN on Thursday evening described how people were staying in packed basements all day for fear of the bombing.
“I just surfaced from the shelter basement of a building, I haven’t been outside the shelter all day because the intensity of the bombardment and airstrikes,” he said. “I just surfaced to use the internet and check the news. People are crammed all over each other in the basements. No one is in the street, it’s dark now and still we hear the jets above.” He then retreated back below ground to the relative safety of the basement.
The Syrian military leaflets, which blame insurgents for the deaths of thousands of women and children and for forcing the residents of Eastern Ghouta to live in shelters, promise that residents who leave will receive food, shelter and medical assistance in addition to a safe return home “once terrorism is eliminated.”
The leaflets are similar to those dropped over rebel-held eastern neighborhoods of the northern city of Aleppo, before the besieged area was taken by government forces in December 2016.
This week’s intense bombardment has prompted fears that a ground offensive could soon be launched against Eastern Ghouta.
UN deadlock
The United Nations Security Council discussed Eastern Ghouta on Thursday but was did not vote on a resolution put forward by Sweden and Kuwait. The US blamed Russia for the deadlock.
Sweden’s ambassador to the United Nations, Olof Skoog, said Russia had proposed new amendments which would be looked at, and that a vote was likely to happen on Friday if the language could be worked out.
“If adopted, this resolution would entail decisive and meaningful action that would make a difference on the ground for the civilian population in Syria. UN convoys and evacuation teams are ready to go,” Skoog said.
Deputy US Ambassador to the United Nations Kelley Currie told the UN Security Council on Thursday that the US was ready to vote on a resolution for a ceasefire in the besieged region “right here and right now.”
“There is no reason to delay. Literally the minute this meeting ends, this Council can take the clearest possible step to help: vote for a ceasefire, and vote for humanitarian access,” Currie said. “What the people of Eastern Ghouta need is not complicated.”