(Previous Incident Code: R4693)

During the morning of Wednesday, 16 October 2024, a five-year-old girl named Jana Omar Hajouz was killed and a number of civilians were reportedly injured by artillery shelling allegedly launched by the Syrian regime and/or the Russian military and/or Iranian military on a family home located between the villages of Maarbalit and Maarzaf in the southern countryside of Idlib, Syria.

According to the Syrian Civil Defence’s post on Twitter/X, a child was killed and there were no other deaths or injuries in the place of the incident. However, the Facebook post by the news outlet Horan Free, referring to a correspondent of Horan Free Movement, claimed that several civilians were injured in the villages of Maarbalit and Maarzaf without specifying their identities. According to this source, the incident occurred in the early morning hours.

Syrian Civil Defense posted an emotional tribute to the young girl: “Five-year-old Jana passed away today, without saying goodbye to her family or her friends in the neighborhood. Her dreams were stolen by regime shells in an artillery attack that targeted her family’s home between the villages of Maarbalit and Maarzaf in the southern countryside of #Idlib, today, Wednesday, October 16.”  The post was accompanied by a photo of her body wrapped in foil and lying on a hospital bed.

Numerous social media users also mourned Jana’s death.

Where sources identified the belligerent, most of the sources attributed the strike to the Syrian regime forces. The news outlet Horan Free emphasized that the Syrian regime forces were allegedly supported by Russian aircraft. The Facebook by Jude Dagestani also held Iranian militias accountable.