Syrian rebels coordinate attacks on regime

BEIRUT -- A rebel unit of army defectors launched a major offensive against security facilities in Syria's largest city of Aleppo, and anti-regime forces targeted air bases to try to reduce the military threat from the skies, activists said Friday.

The coordinated attacks by the Brigade of Free Syrians pointed to a higher-than-usual degree of planning by the rebels, suggesting that President Bashar Assad's opponents are becoming more brazen as the civil war deepens.

The Local Coordination Committees, an activist group that monitors violence and rights abuses in Syria, said rebels shot down a helicopter in the town of Sarmeen. An activist in the area also reported a helicopter was downed. If confirmed, it would be the second such aircraft to be downed by rebels this week. One helicopter was downed in Damascus on Monday.

"People fear for their lives every minute of the day," said Marianne Gasser, the head of the International Committee of the Red Cross delegation in Syria, in a report released in Geneva.

"Every day, dozens of people are killed in the fighting, and increasing numbers of people succumb to their wounds, unable to obtain medical care because of the fighting and the lack of medical supplies, or simply because medical care is not available in their areas," she said.

Weeks of intense bombardment by the Syrian military, including airstrikes and artillery shelling, have failed to dislodge the rebels.

Assad's military, the backbone of his 12-year rule, is bogged down in a stalemate for control of Aleppo and unable to crush the rebels in the capital of Damascus and its suburbs.