The centrally located Syrian town of Palmyra witnessed some of the heaviest air strikes by government forces on Friday, 18 September, since Islamic State (Isis) militants seized the ancient town on 10 May this year. Britain-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said close to 25 air strikes have left at least 26 people dead which included 12 members of the jihadist group.
The air strikes came a day after the Syrian army carried out heavy air raids in the northern city of Raqqa, an IS hotbed, in which close to 18 jihadists and civilians were killed. Palmyra came under the spotlight in May when IS militants after taking control of the town took no time in destroying the 2,000-year-old Temple of Bel, one of Middle East's most important archaeological sites.
In August, Palmyra's Temple of Baalshami dating back to the Roman era was demolished. The demolitions were part of an IS campaign to eradicate anything it viewed as un-Islamic including artefacts, monuments and historical sites.
Again, in August, the militant group beheaded one of Syria's prominent antiquities scholars, Khalid Asaad, in a Palmyra museum courtyard and hung his body from an ancient column. His crime – he relocated antiquities in Palmyra as IS closed in on the city because of fears that the militants would destroy the site.
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http://report24uk.info/article/310355/isis-syrian-jets-pound-islamic-state-targets-in-palymra
