Jerusalem( CNN) Nearly 200 people have been killed in a Syrian government offensive against Islamist fighters and rebels in the country's southwest, forcing tens of thousands of people to flee toward the closed perimeters with Jordan and the Israeli-occupied Golan Heights, according to activists and monitoring groups.
Jordan and Israel are providing aid to the displaced but are refusing to allow Syrian refugees inside their countries. Jordan is already hosting 1.3 million Syrian refugees but closed its borders in 2016 after an ISIS suicide attack killed six of its border guards. The assault happened at a displacement camp in a demilitarized zone between Syria and Jordan. Israel does not typically take in Syrian refugees, except to give them medical treatment.
Airstrikes continued Friday, a day after 55 civilian populations and 10 fighters were killed during aerial bombardment and shelling, according to the local Daraa Martyrs Documentation Office monitoring. Sixteen infants were among the dead on Thursday. The Syrian government said civilians were also fleeing armed opposition groups.
