An enormous explosion hit Aleppo University on Tuesday, killing some 87 students and wounding over 150.
The motive for the bombing is obscure. The regime holds the university and the area around it, so there is no reason for it to bomb the campus (though government bombing can go astray). But there is also nothing to be gained for the revolutionaries by blowing up a university campus.
There are two main theories about the bombing, and both of them see it as a tragic error. ABC concludes that it was likely a regime aerial bombardment that hit the wrong target. ABC says that the scale of destruction at the university is beyond what could be produced by the weaponry known to be in the hands of the rebels (i.e., they only have small and medium weapons).
The France24 correspondent in Aleppo said that what happened was that rebel forces fired a surface to air missile at a government warplane, and missed, their rocket falling on the university instead. If true, this story of a surface to air missile gone astray could explain the huge damage wrought to the campus.
However it happened, it was horrible, and emblematic of the massive violence occurring daily in Syria.
Alarabiya reports on the bombing of Aleppo University:
Even more horrible, the students were only about a third of those killed on Tuesday. The regime hit 350 or so targets throughout the country with aerial bombing raids or artillery strikes, with 237 dead for the day.
ITN reports on the government’s aerial bombardment of parts of Aleppo on Tuesday, and it may be that one of the bombs aimed at such a neighborhood hit the university instead:
What day in Syria these days cannot be labeled “a horror”? This is just another feather in Assad’s hat. He’ll get his when the people catch up with him.
The bombing at the university fits the pattern of some of the more extreme incidents during the Iraq War. Since some factions within the rebel coalition have ties with some of the Sunni Iraqi guerrillas, the adoption of their methods should surprise no one.
The desire on the part of rebels to disrupt whatever institutions may be still functioning in the government-controlled areas of Aleppo is quite possible to understand, especially given that the rebel offensive has recently stagnated in that sector.
Such an attack is no less “rational” than many other tactical decisions made during a war.
In the latest round of violence, there were some car bombings that targeted state forces elsewhere in Syria as well, and not sure whether they’re among the 237 dead mentioned above.
Syrian town of Idlib targeted in multiple bombings
link to bbc.co.uk
Don’t know what to believe on the university. But even if an accident, the onus is still on Assad for these crimes than any of the rebels, even if it were done deliberately by alleged Sunni Islamist militants.
His brutal regime and his delusion in still insisting on being part of ‘reforms’ is just incredible.
Work of the Jihadis for sure. They did the same thing in Iraq. Sunni extremism at its best. The world faces a cancer of Sunni extremism which has been at the root of all terroristic attacks around the world such as 9/11-US, 7/11-UK, 3-11-Spain, 26/11-India, Bali-Indonesia to name a few.
Syrians should look at this attack and see what they are looking forward to if the rebels aided by these terrorists win. Assad looks infinitely better than Sharia law (based on the Sunna) and government of radical extremists.
This was a statement warning of scale of killing coming. Rate of death brought down by Assad outstripped population growth and someone who did timed attack knew of Agent15 somewhere..
Assad and Russia have agents much stronger and know killing.
Yet this is not happening in a vacuum of external events big.
I mean really big, like the certain end of the world shortly.
We, and I mean by that like all people in the world need hope.
Unless we put an end to vicious cycles of lethal gas release the children face a heat increase now which digs in seriously to CH4 stores up North to the tune of approximately #3X coal, oil and natural gas in the entire world. Stable at 30to40km up. A gas some 105X greenhouse gas potential of CO2 20years from escape but potency will up
Will up chances for peace if people see we who live today need to work together and try to head off the end of the world.. Literally. Potential for zoom to economy could go sky high and stay that way forever or the Earth can in short order be lifeless. Pretty simple choice but hard to get the idea across in a world full of corruption, hurt and all sorts of inequity and injustice. That needs switching..