Regime strikes destroy two women's hospitals in northern Syria

Regime airstrikes and rockets on Friday damaged two medical centres dedicated to women in northern Syria, killing several poeple, medical officials and opposition activists said.

Shafak, a Turkey-based Syrian NGO that supports medical facilities in Syria, said their UN-sponsored gynecology and gender-based violence treatment and awareness centre in Termanin village in the northern Idlib province was hit by four consecutive airstrikes Friday afternoon.

The strikes killed two civilians who were in the building and injured a gynecologist and a janitor in the facility.

The centre, 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 centre’s ambulance, emergency room and operation rooms were badly damaged, said Assad al-Halabi, an advocacy manager in Shafak.

Halabi said one of the killed was accompanying a patient. The second killed has not yet been identified.

Images released by Shafak showed extensive damage to the collapsed building, as well as a destroyed incubator and ambulance.

Another gynecology hospital in besieged east Aleppo was also hit Friday.

Abdul-Hamid al-Eissa, al-Zahra hospital manager, said four generators were knocked out and the building was no longer useable.

He said the hospital, in a quarter known to house several medical facilities, was hit with rockets. One civilian was badly injured and his leg had to be amputated, al-Eissa said.

The hospital posted several photographs showing the damage on its Facebook page, adding that all staffers and patients were safe and evacuated.

The government has recently stepped up its bombardment of eastern Aleppo, and by Sunday it had knocked out every hospital in the quarter, according to the World Health Organisation.