(Previous Incident Code: R4512)

A young woman was killed and four other civilians, including two children and a woman, were injured by alleged Syrian regime and/or Russian artillery shelling of Ma’arablit on April 25, 2023.

Afrin Post reported that Noura Abdul Hamid Al-Ahmad, twenty years old, was killed by artillery strikes in Ma’arablit, and her family members, the infant Lyan Muhammad Al-Ahmad, only eight months old, Nour Abdul Hamid Al-Ahmad, sixteen years old, Khadija Abdul Hamid Al-Ahmad, eighteen years old, and Ghufran Najjar, twenty years old, were all injured.

All members of the same family, @SY_plus also reports two of their pet cats died from the strike.

The Syrian Observatory for Human Rights reported that in addition to the one woman killed, four others were injured in the shelling. Other local sources provided similar casualty counts.

Ahmed Razzouk, a volunteer for the White Helmets, gave an account that the family had been gathering and celebrating Eid when the shelling occurred. Ahmed also described 8 month old Lyan, who was injured by shrapnel in her thigh, as crying and shouting for her injured mother after the shelling.

According to multiple sources, artillery shelling from regime and/or Russian forces hit Ma’arablit and other residential areas in the south of Idlib. A military source told Afrin News the Syrian regime’s military began bombing residential areas in Ma’arblit with heavy artillery, affecting many civilian homes. Zaman Al Wasl specified that the shelling was carried out by regime forces stationed in the city of Saraqib. Afrin Post reports the shelling occurred only hours after a meeting between defense ministers from Syria, Russia, Iran, and Turkey, and North Press Agency notes the Northwestern region of Syria, which included Ma’arablit, continues to be affected by violence despite a 2020 de-escalation agreement between Russia and Turkey.