Aleppo
family says goodbye on Twitter
A seven-year-old Syrian girl, who
has captured international attention tweeting about daily life in rebel-held
eastern Aleppo, shared a message late Sunday night that her house had been
bombed.
“Tonight we have no house, it’s
bombed and I got in rubble. I saw deaths and I almost died,” Bana Alabed
tweeted. On Monday, her mother posted an update saying the family was on the
run.
Syrian regime forces launched a
long-threatened ground assault in Aleppo on Saturday, wresting control of a
number of northeastern neighborhoods from rebels — effectively driving a wedge
through the eastern part of the city.
Retaking eastern Aleppo would mark
the biggest victory for the Syrian regime since the uprising began over five
years ago.
Bana’s mother Fatemah told CNN their
home took a direct hit on Sunday evening, forcing them into the street to wait
for the planes to go and shelling to cease.
Fatemah, 26, created the Twitter
account for her daughter in late September to “share our life here to the
world” as the Syrian army launched a major offensive to recapture Aleppo.
“Last message — under heavy
bombardments now, can’t be alive anymore. When we die, keep talking for 200,000
still inside. BYE,” Fatemah tweeted on Sunday night before posting a picture of
her daughter Bana, who appeared to be covered in dust.
The tweet references the estimated
200,000 civilians still living under siege in eastern Aleppo.
The activist-run SMART News Agency said Sunday that airstrikes hit the al-Shaar
neighborhood, where Bana’s family live, injuring at least five people.
Footage shared by SMART News Agency
purported to show people in al-Shaar being carried away from the scene in the
aftermath.
Fatemah told CNN via Twitter direct
message that her children — Mohamed, 5, Noor, 3, and Bana — were not injured in
the strikes and they sought shelter in a nearby house later on Sunday evening.
Hundreds of civilians have fled
Aleppo’s rebel-held east since the assault this weekend. The Syrian Observatory
for Human Rights, a UK-based monitoring group, said the number of
civilians fleeing the city was in the thousands.
The Syrian army told state-run SANA
news agency that its units had secured departure routes for 1,500 people from
eastern Aleppo to regime-held areas on Sunday.
Under heavy bombardments now. In
between death and life now, please keep praying for us.
On Monday, Bana tweeted asking for
people’s prayers amid fresh bombardments. Intense artillery fire by regime
forces continued to target al-Shaar neighborhood on Monday, activists Aleppo
Media Center reported.
“Under heavy bombardments now. In
between death and life now, please keep praying for us,” Bana said in a tweet.
A local Aleppo activist said on Twitter that he did not know anything regarding
the whereabouts of Bana and her family, but that “their neighbourhood is being
targeted heavily.”
A few hours later, Fatemah tweeted that the family was “on the run.”
“We are on the run as many people
killed right now in heavy bombardments. We are fighting for our lives. Still
with you,” Fatemah added.
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