July 2020 | Russian airstrikes kill civilian in Al-Bab and tens of ISIS members in the Syrian desert
The Russian forces completed their 58th month of military operations in Syria. During the tenth month of the 5th year of Russia’s intervention in Syria, SOHR activists documented the killing of a civilian in Russian airstrikes on Al-Bab city in north-eastern Aleppo. Meanwhile, Russian aircraft has killed no civilians in the “de-escalation zone” in July, as the area is under ceasefire agreed upon after the meeting between Russian President Vladimir Putin and his Turkish counterpart Receb Tayyip Erdogan on March 5.
During the 58th month of Russia’s military operations in Syria, SOHR activists have documented the death of one civilian in Russian airstrikes on Al-Bab city. In addition, SOHR activists also documented the killing of 31 ISIS members in Russian airstrikes on their positions in the Syrian desert.
Between the 30th of September 2015 and the 30th of July 2020, the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights documented the death of 20,140 persons distributed as follows:
- 8,651 civilians: 2,098 children under the age of eighteen, 1,317 females over the age of eighteen, 5,236 men and young people
- 5,361 ISIS members
- 6,128 fighters of rebel and Islamic Factions, Hayyaat Tahrir al-Sham, the Islamic Turkestani Party, and fighters of Arab and foreign nationalities.
SOHR sources have reported that Russia used the “Thermite-type explosives” in their airstrikes, a substance composed of aluminium powder and iron oxide which causes burns as it continues to ignite for about 180 seconds; some of the bombs used by Russian jets on the Syrian territory were loaded with this substance.
It has been discovered that they are “RBK-500 ZAB 2.5 SM” cluster incendiary bombs each weighed about 500 kg (about 1100 pounds) and they were dropped by military aircraft. They carried anti-individuals and anti-vehicles small sized bombs of the type (AO 2.5 RTM), loaded with 50 to 110 small-sized bombs stuffed with “Thermite”, which outpour out of it when they explode; the range of this anti-individuals and anti-vehicles bombs reaches 20 to 30 meters.
HD Infographic: Human casualties of the Russian Air-strikes over 58 months of the Russian involvement in Syria
