Airwars assessment
Up to two civilians were reported killed and between two and three civilians were injured in an alleged Russian or Syrian airstrike or artillery shelling on the outskirts of the town of Al Mastouma in the southern countryside of Idlib on February 2nd, 2020.
More specifically, Step News Agency and an Al-Jisr correspondent stated that armed forces attacked the road between Al Mastouma town and the city of Idlib. Multiple sources mentioned that cluster munition was used during the attack on Al Mastouma. According to Edlib Media Center and a tweet from @our_syria, “Two rockets carrying cluster bombs landed in the town of [Al Mastouma].” FN Agency reported that warplanes of the Assad militia targeted the road between Idlib and Al Mastouma with cluster missiles.
Regarding civilian harm, most sources reported the death of one civilian. However, Shaam News Network said that the attack on Al Mastouma took the lives of two civilians. @anastracey identified the victims as Bashar Abdel-Karim Taha and Ahmed Abdel-Karim Taha. Reports on injuries vary. @anastracey made mention of two wounded civilians. The Step News Agency initially said that a number of civilians were injured without giving an exact number, though they later revised their estimate to three.
Al Araby mentioned that the attack on Al Mastouma was part of wider air and missile bombardments by Russian and Regime forces on the countryside of Idlib and Aleppo. They cited the Syrian Response Coordinators team that had observed massive displacement in the southern and western countryside of Aleppo and the southern and eastern Idlib countryside since January 16th, 2020 as a result of these military campaigns.
Sources were conflicted as to who was responsible for the strike, with Nedaa Post attributing the strike to Russian armed forces while FN Agency referred to regime forces as having carried out the strike. Step News Agency initially reported that Russian warplanes bombed the outskirts of Al Mastouma with cluster bombs. However, later on it claimed that Syrian regime forces were responsible for the attack. Shaam News Network attributed the attack on Al Mastouma to both Russia and the Regime, but they consolidated the report into a larger report of strikes across the Idlib governorate.
The incident occured at 16:34:00 local time.
The victims were named as:
Family members (2)