The blast, which struck buses of people who were leaving their towns as part of a rebel-regime swap, also injured 55 others in Rashidin, a suburb of Aleppo in northwestern Syria, according to Syria Civil Defense, also known the White Helmets.

The convoy of buses, which were parked at the time, was carrying thousands of people from two regime-held but rebel-besieged villages in northwestern Syria, state-run media reported. Video shown on Syrian state-run television showed heavily damaged and burned buses parked on the side of a road. People walked outside the buses, surveying the damage as well as bodies lying on the roadway and a grass median.

The evacuees, from the mainly pro-regime Shia villages of Al-Fu’ah and Kafriya, were bound for regime-held parts of Aleppo. The state-run Syrian Arab News Agency reported the convoy continued, and the first buses arrived late Saturday in Aleppo. The buses headed to the Jebrin area for a temporary housing center equipped with food and medical supplies, SANA said. The rebel group Ahrar al-Sham tweeted that some of its members died in the blast. They were at the site to ensure the convoy’s passage, Ahrar al-Sham said. The group said it was investigating to find out who was responsible. The evacuees had been allowed to leave their villages this week as part of a Shia-Sunni exchange agreement between the Syrian government and insurgents who have been fighting a civil war for six years. As part of the deal, government forces are allowing thousands of rebels and civilians to leave two towns in southwest Syria: Madaya and Zabadani, according to the London-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights. Madaya and Zabadani have been under the control of anti-government fighters but facing siege from forces loyal to the regime.

State-run media: Rigged car was disguised

 The explosion happened as both sets of evacuees were stopped in separate locations outside Aleppo. Each were heading to areas controlled by forces friendly to them.

The explosives-rigged car had been packed with children’s food supplies, perhaps to disguise it, a correspondent with SANA reported.

The convoy that departed Al-Fu’ah and Kafriya is carrying 5,000 people, the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said.

Thousands were leaving Madaya and Zabadani, including more than 2,000 rebel fighters, their families and other civilians, the monitoring group said.

The deal was brokered by Iran and Qatar, Agence France-Presse reported. </s> Hundreds leave rebel-held areas after vehicles set on fire on their way to collect villagers from Kefraya and Fua

The evacuation of east Aleppo has resumed, with about 350 people able to leave a rebel-held pocket of the city on Sunday, according to medical officials.

The move came despite the official postponement of evacuations of civilians and fighters from the devastated Syrian city and as the UN security council prepared to vote on a resolution to deploy observers to the city, with Syria-allied Russia giving cautious backing to the measure.

“Five buses carrying the evacuees arrived from besieged parts of east Aleppo,” said Ahmad al-Dbis, who heads a team of doctors and volunteers coordinating evacuations to rebel-held Khan al-Assal, from where they can travel on to other parts of Aleppo and Idlib provinces.

Aleppo: Elegy for a doomed city whose history spans centuries Read more

“They were in a terrible state,” he said.

“They hadn’t eaten, they had nothing to drink, the children had caught colds, they were not even able to go to the toilet.”.

The Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said the 350 were able to be evacuated after Russia and Turkey urged the Syrian regime to allow the convoy of buses to pass its final control point.

Earlier, a deal to free east Aleppo’s remaining civilians in exchange for sick and wounded people from two pro-government villages stalled after six buses sent to evacuate the loyalist areas were stopped and set ablaze.



The buses were intercepted in an area under the control of Jund al-Aqsa, a jihadi faction aligned to the Syrian opposition. The deal to partially lift a siege of the villages, Fua and Kefraya, had been opposed by the al-Qaida-inspired Jabhat Fateh al-Sham, which was largely responsible for a three-year siege of the majority-Shia enclaves.

The Syrian Observatory said on Monday morning that 10 buses had left Fua and Kefraya to take evacuees through rebel-held territory towards Aleppo.

Sabotage attempts have turned an urgent evacuation of up to 40,000 trapped civilians into a protracted series of negotiations, which allow trickles of refugees to leave before breaking down again.



Iran and the Syrian regime have been determined to use the fate of east Aleppo to settle accounts with the opposition elsewhere in the country, while jihadis who influence parts of the rebel movement have delayed the process to win concessions as their grip on northern Syria steadily slips.

Conflict News (@Conflicts) PHOTOS: Reports coming in that an "unknown rebel group" has attacked buses going to evacuate civilians from Kafraya and Fuah - @Ald_Aba pic.twitter.com/7xMPhumeu5

Fua and Kefraya have been key bargaining chips throughout the conflict. Both have been besieged, but not with the same result as east Aleppo. For the past 18 months, Iran has tried to broker a deal with the powerful Islamist militia Ahrar al-Sham which would allow the remaining villagers to be relocated to Zabadani and Madaya, between Damascus and the Lebanese border.

In return, Sunni residents of those towns would be sent to Fua and Kefraya, as part of a population swap that would change the geopolitics of the region and help build a Shia presence from the suburbs of Damascus into Lebanon’s Bekaa valley, and beyond to southern Lebanon.

The population swaps were not part of the original terms of the Aleppo evacuation deal, which were brokered between Russia and Turkey. However, soon after the deal was announced early last week, Iran made a series of its own demands.



In addition to the relocation of sectarian groups, Iran demanded the bodies of slain militia fighters that it had sent to Syria, including members of Hezbollah in Lebanon, and Iraqi militias. It also demanded information about any fighters that had been taken prisoner.



The chaos surrounding the evacuation deal underscores the stakes, with east Aleppo in its death throes and the six-year war beginning to lose steam for the first time. It also underlines how a splintered opposition cannot control all the elements in the fight against the Syrian leadership, even as tens of thousands of civilians remain cornered, many of them in the open with little food in the depths of winter.



A claim of responsibility was posted on social media, purportedly by a jihadi front group, which spoke of the trapped Shia communities in strident sectarian tones.



The Free Syria Army, an umbrella organisation of moderate rebel groups, said: “The people who resisted in Aleppo are paying the price of the irresponsible acts of a few. This was a reckless act endangering the lives of more than 50,000 people. It is a crime and a humiliation against our revolution and the resistance of the beseiged Aleppo people.”

Meanwhile, diplomatic efforts to secure a lifeline to those trapped in east Aleppo appeared to inch forwards after the UN security council agreed a compromise draft resolution on UN monitoring of evacuations. A vote will he be held on Monday, diplomats said.

“We expect to vote unanimously for this text tomorrow at 9 am (1400 GMT),” the US ambassador to the United Nations, Samantha Power, told reporters after more than three hours of negotiations.

The Russian ambassador to the United Nations, Vitaly Churkin, had earlier vowed to veto a French-drafted resolution, arguing that it did not account for the preparation needed for UN officials to be able to monitor evacuations.

Russia, which began air attacks on rebel-held territory in September 2015 in support of the Syrian president, Bashar al-Assad, has vetoed six security council resolutions on Syria since 2011.

“I think we have a good text, we agreed to vote tomorrow morning,” Churkin told reporters after agreeing the compromise draft.

The French-drafted resolution had asked for the UN to “redeploy … humanitarian staff already on the ground to carry out adequate, neutral monitoring, direct observation, and to report on evacuations from besieged parts of Aleppo and protection of civilians inside Aleppo”.

It also urged: “The evacuations of civilians must be voluntary and to final destinations of their choice, and protection must be provided to all civilians who choose or who have been forced to be evacuated and those who opt to remain in their homes.”



The fate of more than 500 men who were detained inside Aleppo, or arrested at checkpoints as they tried to leave remains unknown, and rights groups have expressed serious fears for their safety.



By some estimates, up to 80,000 people have left east Aleppo in recent days, most crossing into the regime-held west of the city. Around 8,000 people were evacuated to the north-west Aleppo countryside as part of the evacuation deal. Opposition fighters were among the first to leave the city. Such a move had been central to the drafted terms, but was also being seen by some of the trapped civilians as an abandonment. </s> Buses began evacuating fighters and civilians from two besieged pro-regime towns in Syria early on Thursday morning under a deal that will allow thousands to leave after three years of encirclement.

Fuaa and Kafraya are the last remaining areas under siege in Syria, where government forces have also repeatedly used crippling blockades during the last seven years of war.

The Shiite-majority towns have been besieged for years by rebels and Hayat Tahrir al-Sham (HTS), a jihadist alliance led by Syria's former Al-Qaeda affiliate.

Surrounded and bombed by hostile factions, the towns became a rallying cry for the government and its ally Iran, as well as a playing card in callous rebel hands.

A deal reached on Tuesday between regime-backer Russia and rebel-ally Turkey would see all the residents taken to government-held territory in exchange for prisoner releases from regime jails.

Starting on Wednesday morning, a series of barricades on the road leading into the towns were removed to let dozens of buses in, AFP's correspondent there said.

All residents -- about 6,900 people including fighters and civilians -- are expected to be ferried out, according to the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights war monitor and an HTS source.

Just after midnight, buses drove out of Fuaa and Kafraya and into a staging ground in the nearby Suwaghiya area, an AFP correspondent there said.

Armed HTS fighters stood on the roadside as the convoy of evacuees inched past, with pro-government militiamen and regular civilians sitting solemnly on board and staring ahead.

The backs of the busses were piled high with suitcases and duffel bags.

"Thirty-two buses have left so far in a first wave of the evacuations. They form about a third of the total that will leave in the operation, which is expected to be done by Thursday morning," said Observatory head Rami Abdel Rahman.

There was no immediate confirmation of the departures from state media, which had earlier reported dozens of buses and ambulances entering the towns.

Fuaa and Kafraya came under siege in 2015 as rebels and jihadists overran the surrounding province of Idlib, cutting off access to food and medicine.

The United Nations and the Syrian Arab Red Crescent delivered humanitarian assistance there in tit-for-tat operations with two government-besieged towns near Damascus.

The four towns also saw coordinated evacuation deals.

In April 2017, thousands were bussed out of Fuaa and Kafraya in exchange for parallel evacuations from the towns of Zabadani and Madaya.

But a blast targeting a convoy of evacuees from Fuaa and Kafraya left 150 people dead, most of them civilians and including 72 children.

Traumatised residents left behind have said they are afraid that scenario might repeat itself with the new evacuations.

Security was tight as the buses very slowly exited the besieged towns, with HTS fighters surrounding the evacuee convoy.

Just before midnight, ambulances carrying 15 sick and wounded residents were let out first and sped in the dark towards the Al-Eis crossing, which connects rebel-held Idlib to regime-controlled parts of Aleppo, AFP's correspondent said.

An HTS source said it was a "good will gesture" ahead of the full evacuation.

According to HTS, more than 100 buses would evacuate 6,900 people from Fuaa and Kafraya in exchange for the release of 1,500 people from government-run jails.

There was no immediate word on the prisoner releases on Thursday morning.

The deal, according to the Britain-based Observatory, would also guarantee that Idlib would be spared a military offensive by the regime.

The northwestern province borders Turkey to the northwest but is otherwise almost totally surrounded by regime territory.

It is home to more than two million people, including Syrian civilians and rebels moved out of other opposition-held territory in surrender deals.

Activists and rights groups have warned such population transfers may amount to forced displacement.

As preparations were underway earlier on Wednesday for the transfers from Fuaa and Kafraya, the International Committee of the Red Cross insisted any movement must be voluntary.

"Any evacuations, in Syria, or elsewhere, must follow basic humanitarian rules: Civilians can choose to stay or leave. Civilians must be protected against attacks -- at all times. Evacuations are temporary -- civilians have the right to return," the ICRC wrote on Twitter.

Syria's conflict erupted in March 2011 with protests against President Bashar al-Assad that later spun out into full-fledged war. </s> SYRIA — The death toll from a bomb explosion targeting evacuees leaving besieged Syrian towns has gone up to 112, a monitoring group said Sunday.

The blast hit a convoy of buses Saturday, according to the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights, which reported the higher death toll.

The blast struck buses of people leaving their towns as part of a rebel-regime swap. In addition to the deaths, it also injured 55 others in Rashidin, a suburb of Aleppo, according to Syria Civil Defense, also known as the White Helmets

The convoy of buses, which were parked at the time, was carrying thousands of people from two regime-held but rebel-besieged villages in northwestern Syria, state-run media reported.

People were evacuating two rebel-held towns in southwest Syria at the same time under a so-called Four Towns Agreement.

Video shown on state television showed charred buses parked on the side of a road. People walked outside the buses, surveying the damage as well as bodies lying on the roadway and a grass median.

The evacuees, from the mainly pro-regime Shia villages of Al-Fu’ah and Kafriya, were bound for regime-held parts of Aleppo.

The state-run Syrian Arab News Agency reported the convoy continued, and the first buses arrived late Saturday in Aleppo. The buses headed to the Jebrin area for a temporary housing center equipped with food and medical supplies, SANA said.

During a televised interview, Rami Abdul Rahman, director of the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights, said a suicide bomber claimed he was carrying food items and blew himself up in a fuel station.

Abdul Rahman said he doesn’t believe the Syrian regime is behind the attack. He said the regime kills scores of people daily using all types of weaponry and doesn’t need to kill its own sympathizers.

The evacuees had been allowed to leave their villages this week as part of a Shia-Sunni exchange agreement between Syria and insurgents who have been fighting a civil war for six years.

As part of the deal, government forces are allowing thousands of rebels and civilians to leave two towns in southwest Syria: Madaya and Zabadani, according to the London-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights.

Madaya and Zabadani have been under the control of anti-government fighters but facing siege from forces loyal to the regime.

The rebel group Ahrar al-Sham tweeted that some of its members died in the blast. They were at the site to ensure the convoy’s passage, Ahrar al-Sham said. The group said it was investigating to find out who was responsible.

The explosion happened as both sets of evacuees were stopped in separate locations outside Aleppo. Each were heading to areas controlled by forces friendly to them.

The explosives-rigged car had been packed with children’s food supplies, perhaps to disguise it, a correspondent with SANA reported.

The convoy that departed Al-Fu’ah and Kafriya had 5,000 people, the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said.

Thousands were leaving Madaya and Zabadani, including more than 2,000 rebel fighters, their families and other civilians, the monitoring group said.

The deal was brokered by Iran and Qatar, Agence France-Presse reported.

A statement from the spokesperson for the U.N. Secretary-General said: “The evacuations were being conducted in accordance with the agreement reached pursuant to the Four Towns agreement. …

“We call on the parties to ensure the safety and security of those waiting to be evacuated. Those responsible for today’s attack must be brought to justice.”

The Syrian American Medical Society said in a statement: “This forced displacement is a clear violation of international humanitarian law, and marks yet another sad chapter in the history of this crisis. The absence of the UN and international community from this process has left the civilian populations especially vulnerable, leading to horrific events such as what took place today.

“The UN must not abandon its role in protecting innocent civilians and enforcing international humanitarian laws.” </s> About 100 people were killed Saturday in a car bomb explosion targeting pro-regime evacuees leaving besieged Syrian towns, a volunteer rescue agency said.

The blast, which struck buses of people who were leaving their towns as part of a rebel-regime swap, also injured 55 others in Rashidin, a suburb of Aleppo in northwestern Syria, according to Syria Civil Defense, also known the White Helmets

The convoy of buses, which were parked at the time, was carrying thousands of people from two regime-held but rebel-besieged villages in northwestern Syria, state-run media reported.

Video shown on Syrian state-run television showed heavily damaged and burned buses parked on the side of a road. People walked outside the buses, surveying the damage as well as bodies lying on the roadway and a grass median.

The evacuees, from the mainly pro-regime Shia villages of Al-Fu’ah and Kafriya, were bound for regime-held parts of Aleppo.

They had been allowed to leave their villages this week as part of a Shia-Sunni exchange agreement between the Syrian government and insurgents who have been fighting a civil war for six years.

As part of the deal, government forces are allowing thousands of rebels and civilians to leave two towns in southwest Syria: Madaya and Zabadani, according to the London-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights.

Madaya and Zabadani have been under the control of anti-government fighters but facing siege from forces loyal to the regime.

The explosion happened as both sets of evacuees were stopped in separate locations outside Aleppo. Each were heading to areas controlled by forces friendly to them.

The explosives-rigged car had been packed with children’s food supplies, perhaps to disguise it, a correspondent with the state-run Syrian Arab News Agency reported.

The convoy that departed Al-Fu’ah and Kafriya is carrying 5,000 people, the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said.

Thousands were leaving Madaya and Zabadani, including more than 2,000 rebel fighters, their families and other civilians, the monitoring group said.

The deal was brokered by Iran and Qatar, Agence France-Presse reported. </s> In this photo released by the Syrian official news agency SANA, smoke rises in green government buses, in Idlib province, Syria. (Photo: AP)

Beirut: Armed men burned five buses that were supposed to be used for an evacuation near Idlib in Syria on Sunday, holding up a deal to allow thousands to depart the last rebel pocket in Aleppo, where evacuees crammed into buses for hours, waiting to move.

In return for the evacuation of fighters, their families and other civilians from Aleppo, mostly Sunni insurgents have agreed that people in the villages of al-Foua and Kefraya, Shi'ite villages they have besieged near Idlib, should also be allowed to leave.

Videos posted on social media showed bearded men with guns cheering and shouting "God is great" after torching the green buses before they were able to reach the villages and pick up the evacuees.

State media said "armed terrorists", a term it uses for all groups fighting against President Bashar al-Assad, carried out the attack. Pro-Damascus Mayadeen television blamed the rebel group formerly known as the Nusra Front.

Rebel officials said an angry crowd of people, possibly alongside pro-government "operatives", was responsible.

Hours after the incident, as the Aleppo evacuees waited on their buses, it was still unclear what impact the bus burning near Idlib would have on the wider agreement.

The commander of forces allied to Assad said on Sunday there was still a chance for states with influence over rebel groups to find a solution to evacuate civilians safely.

In a statement carried by a military news outlet run by Damascus's ally, the Lebanese group Hezbollah, the allied forces leadership said responsibility for the delay in the evacuation falls with "terrorists and their state sponsors".

Some 40 km (26 miles) to the northeast, hundreds of fighters and their families in Aleppo sat or stood in buses after a deal on Sunday to resume evacuations after a three-day hiatus.

The Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said there was no sign the buses had left Aleppo or the villages, and a passenger on one told Reuters he had been on the bus for four hours and was still in the city's rebel enclave.

Syrian state television, citing its correspondent in the city, said buses had started to leave east Aleppo where over 15,000 people had gathered in a square to wait. Many had spent the night sleeping in the streets in freezing temperatures.

Some buses and Red Crescent vehicles arrived at the entrance to al-Foua and Kefraya shortly after the deal was announced, according to al-Manar television, a broadcaster affiliated with Hezbollah.

Soon afterwards, reports that some of them had been burned began to circulate.

Aleppo had been divided between government and rebel areas in the nearly six-year-long war, but a lightning advance by the Syrian army and its allies began in mid-November following months of intense air strikes, forcing the insurgents out of most of the rebel-held territory within a matter of weeks.

According to Syria's al-Ikhbariya TV news, about 1,200 civilians would initially be evacuated from east Aleppo and a similar number from the two villages.

A document cited by al-Manar television and passed to Reuters by rebels and activists said the entire deal would see 2,500 citizens leave al-Foua and Kefraya in two batches, in exchange for the evacuation of people from east Aleppo in two corresponding batches.

Following this, another 1,500 would leave al-Foua and Kefraya in exchange for the evacuation of 1,500 from the towns of Madaya and Zabadani near Lebanon, which are besieged by pro-government forces.

Once evacuees from the villages have safely arrived in government areas, Aleppo fighters and more of their family members will be allowed to leave, in return for subsequent batches of people departing al-Foua and Kefraya, al-Ikhbariya TV reported.

In the square in Aleppo's Sukari district, organizers gave every family a number to allow them on buses.

"Everyone is waiting until they are evacuated. They just want to escape," said Salah al Attar, a former teacher with his five children, wife and mother.

Thousands of people were evacuated on Thursday, the first to leave under a ceasefire deal that would end years of fighting for the city and mark a major victory for Assad.

They were taken to rebel-held districts of the countryside west of Aleppo. Turkey has said Aleppo evacuees could also be housed in a camp to be constructed near the Turkish border to the north.

The chaos surrounding the evacuation reflects the complexity of Syria's civil war, with an array of groups and foreign interests involved on all sides.

The United Nations Security Council is due to vote Sunday on a French-drafted resolution aimed at ensuring that U.N. officials can monitor the evacuations from Aleppo and the protection of civilians who remain.

The draft U.N. text, seen by Reuters on Saturday, also "emphasizes that the evacuations of civilians must be voluntary and to final destinations of their choice, and protection must be provided to all civilians who choose or who have been forced to be evacuated and those who opt to remain in their homes."

However, Russia said it would veto the draft resolution.

"We cannot support it, we cannot allow it to pass because this is a disaster. But there could be another thing which could be adopted today by the Security Council which would accomplish the same goals," Russian Ambassador Vitaly Churkin told reporters.

He circulated a rival Russian text to council members during a closed-door meeting on Sunday ahead of a planned vote on the French draft.

Russia, which has provided military backing to Assad's troops, has vetoed six Security Council resolutions on Syria since the conflict started in 2011. China joined Moscow in vetoing five resolutions.

A crackdown by Assad on pro-democracy protesters in 2011 led to civil war, and Islamic State militants have used the chaos to seize territory in Syria and Iraq. Half of Syria's 22 million people have been uprooted and more than 400,000 killed. </s> BEIRUT — At least 100 people were killed Saturday in an explosion that hit near buses carrying people evacuate from a besieged area of government loyalists, according to the Syrian opposition rescue service.

The explosion was caused by a car bomb, according to Syrian TV and the opposition Britain-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights, who put the death toll earlier at 24 and said it would likely rise.

In footage aired on Syrian TV, bodies, including fighters, were seen lying alongside buses, some of which were charred and others gutted from the blast. Personal belongings could be seen dangling out of the windows. The state TV channel said the car was carrying food aid but a rebel spokesman said the car had been parked in the area and abandoned.

The explosion hit the Rashideen area, a rebel-controlled district outside Aleppo city where evacuation buses carrying nearly 5,000 people from the northern rebel-besieged villages of Foua and Kfraya were stuck, causing a huge plume of black smoke. Residents from the two villages had been evacuated Friday, along with more than 2,000 from Madaya, an opposition-held town outside of Damascus besieged by government forces.

A senior rebel leader said 20 fighters who guarded the buses were killed as well as dozens of passengers. He spoke on the condition of anonymity because he was not authorized to speak to the media. Yasser Abdellatif, a member of the powerful Ahrar al-Sham group which negotiated the deal, said at least 30 rebels were killed in the explosion.

The explosion came as frustration was already mounting over the stalling evacuation process. Thousands of evacuees from the pro-government and opposition areas were stuck opposite sides of the edge of Aleppo city as rebels and government bickered over the terms for evacuating fighters.

Prior to the blast, Syrian Red Crescent teams had distributed meals to the restless evacuees, stuck in limbo after having left their homes over 30 hours earlier. Many were already voicing their dissatisfaction with the wait.

“The people are restless and the situation is disastrous,” said Ahmed Afandar, a resident evacuated from his the opposition area near Madaya. “All these thousands of people are stuck in less than half a kilometre (500 yards).” He said the area was walled off from all sides and there were no restrooms.

Afandar said people were not allowed to leave the buses for a while before they were let out. Food was distributed after several hours and by early afternoon the evacuees from rebel-held areas were “pressured” to sit back on their buses, Afandar said.

“We are not moving forward or backward,” he said. The evacuees from Madaya were expected to head to rebel-held Idlib, west of Aleppo.

Syrian state TV blamed the rebels for obstructing the deal, causing thousands of evacuees to be stuck in bus depots overnight.

Salloum Salloum, a lawmaker speaking on the pro-government al-Ikhbariya TV channel, said efforts were underway to resolve the problem, accusing the rebels of adding new conditions to the deal.

An opposition representative, Ali Diab, told the pan-Arab Al-Arabiya TV that fewer armed men than agreed to were evacuated from the pro-government areas, violating the terms of the agreement.

A resident of Zabadani — another rebel-held town to be evacuated — Amer Burhan says no evacuation had even taken place from there.

The population transfer deal has been criticized by opponents as forced displacement and was not overseen by the United Nations. </s> A car bomb exploded in Rashidin, west of Aleppo, killing dozens of evacuees, including children, that had been waiting on buses evacuating the Syrian towns of Foua (al-Fu’ah/Fuaa) and Kefraya (Kafriya). The evacuation was part of the “Four Towns” deal that the BBC reports was brokered by Iran and Qatar. Foua and Kefraya are besieged government-held towns, the BBC reports. Meanwhile, Madaya and Zabadani are besieged rebel-held towns, the BBC reports. Women and children were among those killed in the attack on the evacuation buses. The buses were filled with predominantly Shia civilians from the two pro-government Shia villages just trying to escape to safety.

Reuters reported that early Friday, civilians from “Shi’ite villages of al-Foua and Kefraya, besieged by rebel forces” left on buses headed for the government-held Aleppo. The buses arrived at the outskirts several hours later. While waiting to enter Aleppo, the buses were attacked.

The Syrian Observatory for Human Rights reportedly said the attack in Rashidin had specifically targeted residents evacuated from predominantly-Shia Foua and Kefraya. An AFP reporter in rebel-held Rashidin reported witnessing bodies, body parts, and blood. Children and other civilians, as well as pro-government fighters, were among those killed in the horrendous attack.

“The suicide bomber was driving a van supposedly carrying aid supplies and detonated near the buses,” the Observatory said.

State media said that the vehicle-borne improvised explosive device (VBIED) had been employed by “terrorist groups.” The Independent reported that the buses were being guarded by “al-Qaeda-linked alliance Hayat Tahrir al-Sham” fighters. Some fighters from that group were also killed in the VBIED explosion. Lebanese journalist Rana Harbi reported on Twitter that the explosion was set off by rebels, but other media outlets have yet to confirm who is responsible for the deaths of Shia civilians, including children.

Thousands of evacuees from the state-held towns of Foua and Kefraya waited in the streets. They had lived “under crippling siege for more than two years,” according to AFP. When the bomb exploded, they had been essentially sitting ducks, stuck on the road in Rashidin. A rebel source told AFP that the evacuees had been left stranded after disagreements came up pertaining to the number of loyalists fighters that were leaving.

“The blast hit the Rashidin area on the outskirts of Aleppo, where dozens of buses carrying mostly Shia Muslim families from pro-government villages were waiting to enter the city,” Lizzie Dearden, a reporter from The Independent, wrote, adding that the Shias had been predominantly targeted by ISIS “and to a lesser extent by al-Qaeda in the past.”

The victims of the blast from the pro-state villages that had reportedly experienced starvation under the siege, The Independent wrote.

“How can anyone trust the ‘rebels’? WE failed these children,” Lebanese journalist Rana Harbi wrote. “WE told them be patient. & after 2 years.. this? Burned in evacuation buses?”

The Cypress Weekly reported that the evacuees had been waiting in their buses to cross into government-held Aleppo. Many injured in the blast ended up entering the city in ambulances.

Dozens died in the blast, but exact numbers are still uncertain. A media unit run by Hezbollah, the Shiite Muslim political party and militant group, said the blast killed at least 40 people, Reuters reported. The Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said more than 24 people were killed, Reuters reported. Other reports indicate as many as 100 evacuees may have been killed in the bombing of the buses.

Journalist Rana Harbi shared extremely graphic images of the scene to her Twitter account, stating that she “can’t do this anymore.”

The images shared on social media depicting the aftermath of the detonation of the VBIED on a road in Rashidin outside of Aleppo may be disturbing to some readers.

Readers should use discretion scrolling down.

The following video and images contain extremely graphic visuals, including the actual deceased bodies of women and children evacuees from Foua and Kefraya, Syria, but have been shared on social media by concerned parties and journalists, reportedly so that the West might have a better idea of the nightmare of Syrian civilians’ lives.

Reporter Tobias Schneider said that evacuees from Zabadani and Madaya are terrified today of retribution against them because they make up the other side of the “Four Towns” evacuation deal. </s> A car bomb near Aleppo city targeted a convoy of buses carrying evacuees from two besieged towns, killing dozens of people, according to Syrian state media and rebels.

Those killed in Saturday’s attack included civilians and pro-regime fighters who had left their homes in the Idlib province towns of Fua and Kafraya, which had for years been besieged by opposition rebels. Rebel fighters who were escorting the convoy were also killed.

Initial casualty tolls varied. Syrian state media blamed the attack on “terrorists,” the term it uses to refer to armed rebels, saying they had targeted some of the 75 buses and 20 ambulances carrying evacuees. The dead included women and children, it said.

U.K.-based opposition monitor the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said at least 43 people had been killed and dozens of others wounded.

A spokesman for Ahrar Al Sham, one of two rebel groups escorting the convoy, blamed the regime for the attack and said it had targeted the side of an exchange post where opposition fighters had lined up their vehicles.

An expanded version of this report appears at WSJ.com.
Rebels attack and burn several buses en route to evacuate ill and injured people from the besieged Syrian villages of Al-Fu'ah and Kafriya.