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BEIRUT /Â AP
At least 20 civilians, including some children, were killed in suspected US-coalition airstrikes on a village east of the IS group’s de-facto capital in Syria, activists reported on Thursday.
The report comes as the militants come under mounting pressure by rival US-backed and Russian-backed forces working to seize the capital, Raqqa. Also on Thursday, engineers restored two water pumping stations that feed water to the country’s largest city, Aleppo, in territory captured by the Syrian government from IS militants this week, state media reported.
Aleppo, once Syria’s industrial capital, suffered for years from severe water shortages as the government and opposition fighters contested the city and the IS group controlled its upstream source — the pumping stations at the town of Khafseh on the Euphrates River.
Pro-government forces defeated the rebels in the city just before the new year and took Khafseh from IS militants earlier this week.
Residents in Aleppo have depended on wells and water deliveries arranged by the government, charities and the UN children’s agency, UNICEF.
Imad al-Khal, 64, a resident of al-Aziziyeh neighborhood in Aleppo, told The Associated Press that municipal water hasn’t reached her home in nine weeks.