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Bombing hospitals is core part of Assad’s strategy

In war zones, ambulances and hospital roofs are often clearly marked with a red cross or crescent to avoid accidental air strikes or other attacks. In Idlib, in the northwest of Syria, where the civil war has stretched into its eighth year, the UN has also shared the coordinates of medical facilities with Bashar al-Assad’s forces and their Russian allies in order to avoid inadvertent attacks.

Despite this deconfliction system, these hospitals have been repeatedly hit since the start of the current offensive in April. In northwest Syria, the US-based human rights group Physicians for Human Rights (PHR) received reports of 46 attacks on health care facilities — and confirmed 16 of them. At least 14 of these facilities were on the UN’s deconfliction list, according to several members of the UN Security Council in a formal diplomatic petition that was reviewed by Reuters.
No matter how much Russia and Syria try to deny their targeting civilians, given that this information was readily shared, it seems apparent that these are not accidents of war or inadvertent attacks.
We should not be surprised. Over the course of the Syrian conflict, there have been at least 578 attacks on health-care facilities and 890 deaths of medical personnel, according to PHR. More than 90% of these attacks were perpetrated by the Syrian regime or the Russian government (or both), according to the PHR.
Targeting health care facilities is a war crime. Syria claims, in a July 16 letter to the UN, that all health-care facilities in Idlib have been rendered “inoperative,” and can no longer be considered “civilian objects” under humanitarian law. But the UN emergency relief coordinator challenged those claims and pointed to facilities that continue to be recognized and supported by the UN, including the medical center at Maarrat al-Numan. Russian military has cooperated closely with the regime and their planes have also taken part in the bombing raids.
Terrorizing civilians is a core part of Assad’s strategy. The Syrian people have been targeted by their own government for daring to ask for a fundamental human right that so many of us take for granted — the right to elect their leadership and have a say in their future. More than 5.6 million people have fled Syria since the start of the conflict in 2011.

Source: Bombing hospitals is core part of Assad’s strategy