At least 35 killed as Syrian jet crashes into market

BEIRUT

A general view shows a plane that belongs to forces loyal to Syria's President Bashar Al-Assad after it crashed in Daraa, Syria June 11, 2015. REUTERS photo

At least 35 civilians were killed and 120 were injured when a Syrian army fighter jet crashed into a busy marketplace in the rebel-held northwestern town of Ariha on August 3, Turkey's state-run Anadolu Agency reported.

Most of the dead were civilians on the ground in the town in Idlib province, which fell to a coalition of Islamist insurgents in May, according to the UK-based Observatory for Human Rights, which tracks violence across Syria. 

There was no immediate reaction from the Syrian army. 

The military plane had been spotted earlier in a bombing raid in the area that has come under heavy aerial bombardment by the Syrian army in recent days, a rebel source said. 

The fall of Ariha had left the insurgents in control of most of Idlib, a region that borders Turkey and neighbours President Bashar al-Assad's heartland in Latakia province on the Mediterranean coast. 

The army has been trying to beat back insurgent gains that brought them closer to government-held coastal areas north of the capital Damascus.