3 Dead, Dozens Injured After Suspected Chlorine Gas Attack in Syria

Impact

A woman and two children are dead after what's being called a suspected chemical attack on a rebel-held neighborhood of Aleppo, Syria, health officials said, according to Time.

A first responder alleged that on Wednesday night, a government helicopter dropped four barrel bombs on the residential al-Zibdieh neighborhood of eastern Aleppo. But instead of being filled with shrapnel and bits of metal, medics say they saw symptoms "compatible with chlorine gas." So far, other reports have counted at least 70 patients affected by the attack.

Time reports that samples were taken from the clothing of patients in order to check for signs of chlorine gas, but, because of tight security, they haven't made it outside of Syria to be tested.

If it was chlorine gas, this wouldn't be the first time the Syrian regime was accused of using chemicals in attacks that injured and killed civilians. In March 2015, the Independent reported that Syrian forces used a chemical thought to be chlorine to kill a family of six. Zaher al Saket, a Syrian brigadier general and defector, has investigated over 90 chlorine-based attacks from the Syrian regime, he told NPR.

United Nations officials say they would consider a chlorine gas attack, if confirmed, to be a war crime.