Syria Air Strikes Target Civilians
According to the UK-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights, 110 people were killed and over 300 wounded in a series of air strikes on a crowded market place in Douma, a rebel-held town near Damascus.
This is a second attack on the market place this week, with 27 people killed in air strikes last Wednesday.
![More than 1,600 civilians were killed during the month of July, a majority due to air strikes and barrel bombs [AFP]](http://www.aljazeera.com/mritems/imagecache/mbdresplarge/mritems/Images/2015/8/1/54eb6585a1ef43f089bd024b94a2e23d_18.jpg "Highest number of Syria air strikes recorded in July")
The crowded market place was filled with people when the air strikes occurred. After the first attack, many people rushed to the site to help evacuate the wounded, when more raids hit.
According to the Syrian Observatory of Human Rights, most of the dead and wounded are civilians.
During the month of July 2015, the Syrian government conducted nearly 7,000 air strikes, making it the most intense bombing reported in one month since the beginning of the conflict in 2011.
The Syrian Network for Human Rights, another group monitoring the war, recorded a total death toll of 1,674 during the month of July – over half of those killed were women and children.
The group said that the rising death toll was an indicator that government forces have been “deliberately and indiscriminately targeting civilians”.
- Pray for Syria. Pray for peace and reconciliation between the warring factions and an end to the destructive civil war.
- Pray for those who have lost family members and loved ones in the air strikes. Pray that they will find comfort in their grief.
- Pray for Christians in Syria, and those working in refugee camps, for compassion, love and grace to flow through them, and that many will come to know healing and salvation through the Gospel of Jesus Christ.
- Pray for protection for Syria’s Christians.
Isaiah 61 vs 1 – 3: “The spirit of the Lord God is upon me,
because the Lord has anointed me; he has sent me to bring good news to the oppressed, to bind up the broken-hearted, to proclaim liberty to the captives,
and release to the prisoners; to proclaim the year of the Lord’s favour, and the day of vengeance of our God; to comfort all who mourn; to provide for those who mourn in Zion … “
Source: http://www.aljazeera.com/news
