Syria Rebels Vow to Continue Fight in Aleppo after Retreat

Syrian rebels vowed to fight on in Aleppo a day after being driven out of a key district under heavy shellfire, which was targeting other parts of the strategic city on Friday.

A rebel commander, Hossam Abu Mohammed, said his men were still fighting in parts of Aleppo's southwestern district of Salaheddin after most fled on Thursday under heavy bombing and advancing troops.

"We will not let Salaheddin go," the Free Syrian Army's Abu Mohammed told Agence France Presse by telephone as the third day of a government offensive to take the city raged.

The army again bombed parts of Salaheddin on Friday, as well as the Sakhur and Hanano districts of the east of the city, the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said, adding that the violence killed two civilians.

Just before dawn, a MiG 21 fighter jet dropped four bombs on rebel positions in Hanano, an AFP correspondent reported.

One struck the courtyard of the FSA headquarters in the neighborhood and another nearby house, wounding a number of people.

Angry residents shouted hostile slogans against France and the United States, saying: "No one is helping us."

"We are behind the Free Syrian Army, but it is because of them that all of this is happening," one of them lamented.

Fighting on Thursday killed 27 people in Aleppo, 15 of them civilians, the Britain-based Observatory said.

They were among at least 191 people killed nationwide -- 107 civilians, 45 rebels and 39 soldiers.

On Thursday, Abu Mohammed said fighters withdrew to the Sukari district, a bit more than a mile (1.5 kilometers) to the southeast of Salaheddin, and were preparing for a counter-attack.

Wassel Ayub, who commands the Nur al-Haq Brigade, said the FSA had withdrawn "to open a new front in Saif al-Dawla and Mashhad."

Meanwhile, shelling by the Syrian army has damaged Aleppo's historic citadel, part of a world heritage site in the heart of the commercial capital, the exiled opposition said on Friday.

"Photographs by activists and archeological associations show that the Aleppo citadel... has been damaged," the Syrian National Council said in a statement.

One photograph distributed by the group appeared to show damage to the citadel's entrance.

"The way in which the shell hit the main entrance of the fortress and broke the marble panel bearing its name suggests that the Syrian regime intentionally targeted the site," the SNC charged.

"Only regime loyalists have the kind of shell that hit."

Aleppo's old city has been listed by the U.N. Education, Scientific and Cultural Organization as a World Heritage Site since 1986.

The listing says that the 13th-century citadel, 12th-century Great Mosque and 17th-century Islamic schools, palaces, caravanserais and bathhouses are of "outstanding universal value."

"The monumental Citadel of Aleppo, rising above the souks (markets), mosques and madrasas (Islamic schools) of the old walled city, is testament to Arab military might from the 12th to the 14th centuries," it says.

It was not immediately possible to independently verify the opposition's claim of damage to the citadel.