As a part of the continued escalation on Hama countryside…airstrikes and rocket shelling continue on the towns and villages of the north of Hama
Hama Province – The Syrian Observatory for Human Rights: the aerial and rocket shelling is continuing on the northern countryside of Hama, as a part of the continued escalation by the regime forces and warplanes, where the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights monitored raids by warplanes targeting places in Al-Lataminah and Kafr Zita towns and Al-Arba’in village, along with the continued rocket shelling on areas in Al-Lataminah and its outskirts, while a rocket shell fell on Safsafiyah village which is controlled by the regime forces west of Hama, without information about casualties, an the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights published few hours ago that it monitored continued escalation of shelling by the regime forces and gunmen loyal to them on the northern sector of Hama countryside, where it has been targeted since today morning, Thursday the 24th of May 2018, where the shelling targeted areas in the agricultural lands and corps in the vicinity of the villages and towns of Al-Zakah, Al-Latamainah and Kafr Zita, raising to more than 309, the number of rocket and artillery shells fired by the regime forces in the latest week, of their shelling escalation on with the gunmen loyal to them, on the northern countryside of Hama, the southern countryside of Idlib and Sahl AL-Ghab area in the north-west of Hama, also Jaysh al-Izza operating in both Hama and Idlib countryside, targeted the areas of the Power Plant and Salhab, in the western countryside of Hama, which are controlled by the regime forces, which caused material damage, without information about casualties so far.
The reliable sources confirmed to the Syrian Observatory that the regime forces and gunmen loyal to them tend to target agricultural lands and crops, in the vicinity of the towns, cities and villages which are located in the southern sector of Idlib, Shal Al-Ghab and the north of Hama, where the fires burned hundreds of hectares of agricultural land, and the shelling was concentrated more on the areas of Al-Lataminah and Kafr Zita, as a part of the regime forces’ intention with their allies to burn the corps in these areas, while sources informed the SOHR that the regime forces tend, on the contact lines between them and the factions’ controlled areas, to threaten the locals to burn their crops, if they don’t pay a royalty of about 1000 Syrian Pounds for each 1000 square km of agricultural land belonging to them, where gunmen loyal to the regime force burned an agricultural land few days ago while two women were inside it, as a revenge for the crop owners’ refuse to pay the royalty, which resulted in the burning of the two women in their agricultural crops, where the SOHR published yesterday that two women were killed after fighters loyal to the regime burned their agricultural crop in Jalma area, located in the northwestern countryside of Hama, and the locals confirmed that the gunmen loyal to the regime burned the crop when the 2 women were inside it; under the pretext of the crop owners’ refuse to pay money in exchange for allowing them to harvest their land in the village, which caused the crop to be burned as well as the immediate death of both women and the burn of their bodies.