Syrian troops kill 22 rebels in Aleppo

A total of 22 armed rebels were killed Tuesday by a Syrian military offensive against rebels' positions in the country's northwestern province of Aleppo, the official SANA news agency reported. "The armed forces have targeted gatherings of terrorist groups in Dar Ezzah area in Aleppo, killing 22 and injuring 10 others," SANA said, adding that all of the targeted "terrorists" were not Syrians. Earlier in the day, SANA said five people were killed and 26 were wounded by a rebel mortar attack against the Nile and Mokambo streets in Aleppo. Aleppo, Syria's largest city and its economic hub, has emerged as a main battlefield in the country's three-year-old crisis since the rebels vowed to "liberate" Aleppo from the government forces in June 2012. Since then, the clashes have been incessant and the rebels managed to seize considerable swathes of land in Aleppo, but the government forces have recently launched an offensive to regain control of the city. The battles in Aleppo are part of a wider war that have swept Syria since the beginning of the crisis in mid-March 2011. Meanwhile, the Britain-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights on Tuesday updated the death toll in Syria, saying more than 150,000 people have been killed since the eruption of the war.