by WorldTribune Staff, June 26, 2016

Russian and Syrian warplanes pounded an area in eastern Syria held by Islamic State of Iraq and Levant (ISIL), killing at least 82 people, including 58 civilians, a monitoring group reported on June 26.

“Three Russian and Syrian regime air raids on the region of Al-Quriyah, southeast of Deir Ezzor city, killed 58 civilians,” the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said, adding that 24 other people were killed, without specifying whether they were civilians or ISIL fighters.

ISIL controls about 60 percent of Deir Ezzor city, the capital of the province of the same name, which borders the Raqqa province, where the terrorist group’s main stronghold lies.

Meanwhile, Hizbullah on June 24 said it would increase its military presence in support of the Bashar Assad regime in Syria’s Aleppo.

In a rare acknowledgment of battlefield losses, Hizbullah leader Hassan Nasrallah said that 26 of the group’s fighters had been killed in the Aleppo region since the beginning of June.

“We are facing a new wave, or a new stage, of projects of war against Syria which are being waged in northern Syria, particularly in the Aleppo region,” Nasrallah said in a speech broadcast live on the group’s Al-Manar TV.

“The defense of Aleppo is the defense of the rest of Syria, it is the defense of Damascus, it is also the defense of Lebanon, and of Iraq. … It was necessary for us to be in Aleppo and we will stay in Aleppo. We will increase our presence in Aleppo,” he said.

Aleppo is currently split between government and rebel control.

  Airstrikes by Russia and Syrian regime kill 58 civilians near ISIL-held Deir Ezzor, Aleppo, Bashar Assad, Hassan Nasrallah, Syrian Observatory for Human Rights, WorldTribune.com