BEIRUT – Six children were among at least 15 civilians killed in overnight bomb attacks by government and rebel forces in the divided city of Aleppo, a monitoring group said Monday.

Fomer UN envoy says, jihadist group spearheading the offensive in Iraq, was “ten times more active in Iraq than in Syria”.

“At least nine civilians, three of them children, were killed in barrel bombs (dropped by regime aircraft) in Shaar,” an eastern district, said the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights.

The Britain-based group, which relies on an extensive network of medical, military and activist sources on the ground, warned the death toll could rise because of the large number of people of seriously wounded.

“Six more civilians, including three children and a woman, were killed in mortar shelling by rebels” of the government-held district of Jabiriyeh, the Observatory said.

The northern metropolis of Aleppo, once Syria’s commercial capital, has been divided since 2012 into western sectors held by the government and rebel-held areas.

Hundreds of people have died in near-daily regime air raids, many with the use of crude and inaccurate barrel bombs, despite repeated condemnation by the international community.

The latest bloodshed came at the start of the Eid al-Fitr feast which marks the end of the Muslim fasting month of Ramadan.

In Damascus, President Bashar al-Assad received a warm welcome from the congregation as he joined Eid prayers Monday at a mosque in Muhajarin, although the Observatory said the area was struck in the morning by rebel shellfire.