AS BOMBS CONTINUED TO FALL ON ALEPPO, REBEL LEADERS WERE HOPING THAT FIGHTING WOULD STOP THURSDAY TO ALLOW FIGHTERS AND TENS OF THOUSANDS OF CIVILIANS TO REACH SAFETY.
• Syrian rebel leaders were holding out hope that a ceasefire deal between rebels and the Syrian government in Aleppo would be in effect once again Thursday after collapsing on Wednesday.
The evacuation from a sliver of territory the rebels still hold in eastern Aleppo was supposed to begin at dawn Wednesday, but shelling resumed in the morning hours, with fighter jets carrying out deadly air raids over the opposition’s densely crowded enclave in the east of the city.
Buses meant to be used in the pullout of rebels and civilians returned to their depots empty.
The attacks threatened to scuttle plans for the day to evacuate rebels and tens of thousands of civilians out of harm’s way, in what would seal the opposition’s surrender of the city.
Some shells fell near and around the one remaining hospital in the one-squaremile enclave. It was nearly impossible for rescuers to account for the dead because of the continued bombings, they said.
“They began to strike as if there’s no such thing as a ‘ceasefire’ or ‘civilian evacuation,’ ” said media activist Mahmoud Raslan.
Spokesmen for the three rebel groups said the first group of wounded people and civilians would begin leaving early Thursday morning.
But Syrian President Bashar Assad, speaking in an interview aired Wednesday with Russia Today, said the ceasefire was designed stop his government’s advance in the city and “keep the terrorists and save them.”
There were media reports late Wednesday that the ceasefire was back on track, but they were not confirmed.
The surrender of Aleppo’s remaining opposition-run neighbourhoods would be a turning point in Syria’s civil war and leaves Assad in control of almost all major urban areas — and poised to petition for a role in the world community’s broader war against the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant, which is still clinging to parts of Syria’s northeast.