A first responder in Syria's besieged city of Aleppo told NBC News on Monday that conditions there were increasingly dire amid a government offensive to capture the rebel stronghold.
Ismail Alabdullah, a volunteer rescue worker with the White Helmets, described the siege as the heaviest bombing he had experienced in the country's five-year civil war.
"I can't describe this bombing," Alabdullah told NBC's Richard Engel. "I mean non-stop bombing, every time, every second, every minute."
Officials and independent observers said that government forces, which are backed by the Russian Air Force and thousands of Shiite militia fighters, had captured 10 neighborhoods in the country's largest city from rebels.
A win for government forces there would put Syria's four largest cities back under the control of Bashar al-Assad.
Alabdullah pleaded for help from the international community to "end this massacre," but he acknowledged that such an outcome was, at this point, unlikely.
"I'm pretty sure, 100 percent they will not do anything," he said, adding: "The Syria revolution is now going to end. They will not hear our voices."
Alabdullah said it was impossible to leave to Aleppo — "there is no road to go out" — and that many people remain trapped in a small western section of the city. There is no electricity there, nor are there medical supplies and he anticipated running out of fuel in two days, he said.
"The streets are full of people," he said. "They are walking in the streets without any, like, clothes or food."
He added: "It's like more than hell."
Still, Alabdullah said he had no choice but to continue working.
"I didn't stay in Aleppo City for these years to surrender at the end," he said. "We are doing our duty to our country and for our people. Will not surrender, will not give up, will not give up."
Ismail Alabdullah, a volunteer rescue worker with the White Helmets, described the siege as the heaviest bombing he had experienced in the country's five-year civil war.
"I can't describe this bombing," Alabdullah told NBC's Richard Engel. "I mean non-stop bombing, every time, every second, every minute."
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| Syrian civil defense volunteers, known as the White Helmets, rescue a boy from the rubble following a reported barrel bomb attack on the Bab al-Nairab neighborhood of the northern Syrian city of Aleppo |
Officials and independent observers said that government forces, which are backed by the Russian Air Force and thousands of Shiite militia fighters, had captured 10 neighborhoods in the country's largest city from rebels.
A win for government forces there would put Syria's four largest cities back under the control of Bashar al-Assad.
Alabdullah pleaded for help from the international community to "end this massacre," but he acknowledged that such an outcome was, at this point, unlikely.
"I'm pretty sure, 100 percent they will not do anything," he said, adding: "The Syria revolution is now going to end. They will not hear our voices."
Alabdullah said it was impossible to leave to Aleppo — "there is no road to go out" — and that many people remain trapped in a small western section of the city. There is no electricity there, nor are there medical supplies and he anticipated running out of fuel in two days, he said.
"The streets are full of people," he said. "They are walking in the streets without any, like, clothes or food."
He added: "It's like more than hell."
Still, Alabdullah said he had no choice but to continue working.
"I didn't stay in Aleppo City for these years to surrender at the end," he said. "We are doing our duty to our country and for our people. Will not surrender, will not give up, will not give up."
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