Syria state TV says terrorists kill Syrian air force general -...

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Syrian state television said on Tuesday that an air force general was assassinated in a Damascus suburb, the latest in a string of attacks on high-level figures from President Bashar al-Assad's administration.

"Terrorists assassinated General Abdullah Mahmoud Al-Khalidi in Rukn al-Din," state TV said in a news flash without giving details. Rebels fighting to overthrow Assad have targeted top military and political figures. In July, a bomb killed the defence minister and Assad's brother-in-law, Assef Shawkat.

Earlier on Tuesday, a Syrian airforce raid on a rebel-held town, strategically situated on the Damascus-Aleppo highway, killed at least six civilians, including children, opposition campaigners in the area said.

Video footage showed men pulling out the body of a toddler from a flattened building in a northern neighbourhood of Maarat al-Numaan, 300 kilometres (188 miles) north of Damascus, which has been under aerial and ground bombardment since rebels seized control last month.

The footage could not be independently verified.

This as cashes between Syrian rebels and government troops continued close to the border between Turkey and Syria early on Tuesday. Smoke could be seen rising from the town of Haram in Syria's Idlib province and gunfire was also audible from the Turkish side.

Syrian regime forces have been battling rebels near Haram, across the border from the Turkish village of Besaslan, despite a cease-fire that was supposed to halt fighting over a four-day Muslim holiday this weekend.

On Monday Syrian fighter jets pounded rebel areas across the country with scores of airstrikes that anti-regime activists called the most widespread bombing in a single day since Syria's troubles started 19 months ago.

The internationally sanctioned four-day cease-fire was supposed to coincide with the Muslim holiday of Eid al-Adha, one of the holiest periods of the Muslim calendar.

But violence marred the truce almost immediately after it was to go into effect on Friday and continued apace through the weekend.

Meanwhile, activists say Syrian troops and rebels are clashing in a Palestinian refugee camp in the capital, Damascus.

They also say fighter jets have resumed attacks on the northern province of Idlib and suburbs of the capital. Tuesday's airstrikes come a day after activists reported the most widespread bombing in a single day since Syria's 19-month crisis began.

The Britain-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights and the Local Coordination Committees say fighting in the Yarmouk refugee camp broke out after midnight. They had no word on casualties.

Palestinian refugees in Syria tried to stay on the sidelines when the uprising against President Bashar Assad began in March. But many Palestinian youths have joined the fight as they became enraged by mounting violence and moved by Arab Spring calls for greater freedoms.

International Positions:

Qatar’s Prime Minister Sheikh Hamad bin Jassem al-Thani accused the International community and the Syrian regime, with complicity of waging a "war of extermination" against the Syrian people.

In an interview with Al-Jazeera satellite channel late on Monday Sheikh Hamad took issue with UN-Arab League peace envoy Lakhdar Brahimi, who earlier in the day had classified the deadly conflict in Syria as a "civil war."

This war, he said, was being waged "with a license to kill, endorsed firstly by the Syrian government and secondly by the international community."

With reference to both Russia and China, which have repeatedly vetoed UN Security Council resolutions threatening action against President Bashar al-Assad's regime, Hamad also pointed the finger at the two major powers.

Qatar is widely accused of arming rebels fighting Assad's forces.

It called, without success, in the UN General Assembly last month for an Arab intervention force in Syria and a buffer zone to protect refugees.

For its part, Turkey announced via Foreign Minister Ahmet Davutoğlu that it will no longer hold talks with the regime which “persisted with the onslaught against its people throughout the Adha truce”.

In Jordan, 61 Syrian nationals were arrested for entering the kingdom illegally.

AP/LBCI