Four civilians, including a child and two women, were killed, and at least 40 others were injured as a result of artillery shelling carried out by the temporary authority forces on the Sheikh Maqsoud and Ashrafieh neighborhoods, which have a Kurdish-majority population, in the city of Aleppo in northern Syria, on 6 January 2026.
The temporary authority forces targeted inhabited residential neighborhoods, leading to human losses among civilians. Circulating video recordings showed armed men affiliated with the temporary authority launching rockets toward what they described as “SDF gatherings,” while other footage documented the movement of tanks and heavy military vehicles toward the surroundings of the Ashrafieh and Sheikh Maqsoud neighborhoods. Conversely, media outlets affiliated with the temporary authority reported that the shelling was carried out by the Syrian Democratic Forces “SDF” and targeted neighborhoods in the city of Aleppo, resulting in killed and wounded.
This shelling comes in the context of a tightened siege imposed by the temporary authority forces on the Sheikh Maqsoud and Ashrafieh neighborhoods since September 2025, during which repeated military attacks and violations against the civilian population and their basic means of livelihood occurred. The siege included preventing the entry of basic materials, particularly fuel and construction materials, imposing checkpoints and strict inspection measures, in addition to restricting residents’ movement toward the rest of Aleppo’s neighborhoods, which negatively affected humanitarian and service conditions, especially in the fields of education and heating.
In this context, the “Education Committee” in the two neighborhoods issued a decision on 30 December 2025 to close all schools, totaling 13 schools, affiliated with the Autonomous Administration and joint schools, due to the lack of heating means resulting from the siege. Incidents of arrest were also recorded in the surroundings of the two neighborhoods.
Additionally, the temporary authority forces, represented by “Hay’at Tahrir al-Sham,” launched a large-scale attack on the two neighborhoods on the night of 26 December 2025, using heavy machine guns and artillery, in conjunction with the deployment of tanks and military vehicles to the area’s surroundings.
On 22 December 2025, similar attacks were carried out using heavy weapons and mortar shells, resulting in the killing of the citizen Fadwa Mohammad al-Kurdi and the injury of 19 other civilians, including women and children, amid violent clashes in the surroundings of the two neighborhoods. This was accompanied by the circulation of video recordings containing inciting calls and hate speech, in addition to the broadcast of scenes showing armed men directing artillery toward residential neighborhoods.
These incidents fall within a continuous pattern of violations affecting the basic rights of civilians in the Sheikh Maqsoud and Ashrafieh neighborhoods, foremost among them the right to life and security, freedom of movement, access to basic needs, and education, in light of the ongoing siege and military attacks on inhabited residential areas.
