Syrian forces attack refugee camp to flush out jihadists

SYRIAN and Russian forces yesterday attacked a Palestinian refugee camp under the control of Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant, as they closed in on the last rebel-held territory in Damascus.

Pro-government troops launched air strikes and fired missiles into Yarmouk camp to rid the area of the jihadists.

Air strikes have destroyed more than half the refugee site in the past few weeks, leaving civilians trapped in uninhabitable conditions.

Before the Syrian civil war started in 2011, Yarmouk was home to around 160,000 Palestinian refugees, displaced from their homes in modernday Israel during the 1948 war. More than 100,000 Syrians also lived there.

When the Syrian revolution moved to Yarmouk, many Palestinians were forced to take sides. Some sought protection from Syria, others turned to rebel groups. It is now home to a few hundred civilians after the rest fled, according to the United Nations, which says most were elderly residents.

Yarmouk was the scene of the heaviest fighting in the country since nearby Eastern Ghouta fell into government hands a month ago. Dozens of civilians were killed, including some shot by snipers as they tried to flee. About 140 fighters from both sides have also been killed, the Uk-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights reported.

Victory in Yarmouk would clear the capital of all forces opposed to the government and further cement President Bashar al-assad’s dominant position. ♦ The Organisation for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons said yesterday that banned chlorine munitions appear to have been dropped on a neighbourhood in the northern Idlib province in February.