More Hospitals Bombed, This Time in Syria

This was posted yesterday to the website of Médecins Sans Frontières (MSF; Doctors Without Borders):

At least 35 Syrian patients and medical staff have been killed, and 72 wounded, in a significant increase of air strikes on hospitals in Northern Syria, according to health staff supported by Médecins Sans Frontières (MSF) inside Syria.

The escalation of attacks, which began in late September, have targeted twelve hospitals in Idlib, Aleppo, and Hama governorates throughout October, including six hospitals supported by MSF. Overall, six hospitals were forced to close, including three supported by MSF, and four ambulances destroyed. One hospital has since reopened yet access to emergency, maternity, paediatric and primary health care services remains severely disrupted.

[...]

“After more than four years of war, I remain flabbergasted at how International Humanitarian Law can be so easily flouted by all parties to this conflict,” said Sylvain Groulx, Head of MSF for Syria. “We can only wonder whether this concept is dead. So many humanitarians and health actors including MSF have repeatedly called and are calling for an immediate halt to such attacks across the country, but are our voices being heard?”

Winter is rapidly approaching, temperatures are dropping, and there are already tens of thousands of refugees; the need for health care just keeps rising as the ability to deliver it keeps falling.

The post does not say who was responsible for the air strikes, but for the last month the region has been subjected to an intense air offensive by Russian and Syrian jets, so there really isn’t much doubt.

This comes on top of the U.S. destruction of the MSF hospital in Kunduz, Afghanistan, – see these diaries by LaFeminista, Meteor Blades, and michelewin– and the destruction of an MSF hospital in Yemen by Saudi-led airstrikes, recently detailed in a diary by Richard Brook.

It just keeps getting uglier.