Friday’s attack in the village of al-Jadidah, near the town of Jisr al-Shughour, also injured 12 others, including eight children. The attack is the first of its kind in months and has disrupted the relative calm recently enjoyed by the region, which is far from the front lines of the region. A local observer told Al Jazeera that two Russian Su-34 jets had targeted the area with four airstrikes in the early hours of the morning. The Britain-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights also said Russian jets carried out four strikes. Munir al-Mustafa, deputy director of the White Helmets, said the group’s teams in the area found seven bodies and transported 12 wounded to a local hospital, adding that the attacks hit a chicken farm and the home of a displaced family on the outskirts of al – Jadidah. “It took almost three hours to get the victims out from under the rubble, while the Russian planes were still flying in the sky, and the possibility that they were targeting the rescue teams,” al-Mustafa told Al Jazeera. Ahmed al-Khatib, a surgeon at the local hospital in al-Qaniyah village, confirmed that the hospital had received 12 wounded, mostly children, and that seven people had died, including the four children, who were between one and seven years old. The four bodies of the children, two girls and two boys, lay on the hospital floor wrapped in blankets, the girls’ hair still tied with red hair bows. The family members of the victims could not believe what had happened. One of the children’s relatives sat in tears next to their bodies, trying to understand why the attack took place. “What were these little guys doing? Were these sleeping children terrorists?’ asked the man, who did not give his name, while also demanding justice. Rescue workers dig through the rubble after an air strike on a house in al-Jadidah, Idlib province, on July 22, 2022 [Ali Haj Suleiman/Al Jazeera] Ahmed Abdul Hai, a 36-year-old from Hama governorate, said his house was hit and some of his family members were killed in the attack. “We were trying to find a safe place for our children and our families, but the third strike hit my house directly and killed my nephew and injured three of my children,” Abdul Hayy told Al Jazeera, who said that the youngest injured child was only Two and a half. “It was a scary experience, it was very difficult to see my children injured. The minutes it took to get them to the hospital seemed like hours. “We moved here from Hama because it is relatively safe as the people are Christian, but it seems that Russia and [Syrian President Bashar] al-Assad is killing everyone on the opposite side,” Abdul Hai added. The United Nations Deputy Regional Humanitarian Coordinator for the Syria Crisis, Mark Cutts, condemned the attack. “Parties to the conflict have a responsibility to ensure that civilians are protected,” Cutts said. “Attacks against civilians and civilian infrastructure must stop.” The Syrian government’s attacks in Idlib have been focused on the Jabal al-Zawiyah region in the south of the province. In recent weeks, the intensity of shelling has increased between government and opposition forces on all front lines in Idlib, and a recent attempt by government forces to advance on Maarat al-Naasan, east of Idlib. The uptick in violence comes as Turkey continues to insist it will carry out a military operation against the mainly Kurdish Syrian Democratic Forces, despite opposition from the Syrian government, as well as Russia and Iran. A 2011 uprising in Syria turned into war after the government responded violently to the country’s protest movement. Russian intervention on the side of the government in 2015 turned the tide of the conflict, with Idlib now the only province largely controlled by the opposition. The war has killed more than 300,000 civilians, according to the UN.
