At least a dozen civilians have lost their lives when Turkish artillery units shelled the purported positions of the Takfiri Daesh terrorists and US-backed Kurdish forces in Syria’s troubled northern province of Aleppo.
The so-called Syrian Observatory for Human Rights reported on Friday that the projectiles slammed into a residential neighborhood in the city of al-Bab, located 30 kilometers south of the Turkish border and 40 kilometers northeast of Aleppo, claiming the lives of 12 civilians and leaving 10 others wounded.
The Britain-based monitoring group said the victims were members of three families, warning that the death toll is expected to rise as some people are still trapped under debris.
The report came a day after an unnamed military source said the Turkish military would dispatch 300 commandos to northern Syria, without providing any information on whether they had crossed into Syria, and where in northern Syria they would be deployed.
On August 24, the Turkish air force and special ground forces kicked off the so-called Operation Euphrates Shield inside Syria in a declared bid to support the Free Syrian Army militants and rid the border area of Daesh terrorists and fighters from the Kurdish People’s Protection Units (YPG) and Democratic Union Party (PYD).
The offensive was launched in coordination with the US-led military coalition, which has purportedly been fighting Daesh extremists since 2014.
The incursion was the first major Turkish military intervention in Syria, which drew strong condemnation from the Syrian government for violating the Arab country's sovereignty.