We saw al-Qaeda in the Islamic Maghreb do the same thing in Mali.

BEIRUT, APRIL 24 – The ancient minaret of the Grand Mosque of Aleppo has been razed to the ground, as documented in amateur videos published online by activists in the northern Syrian city on Wednesday. The minaret dated from 1090 AD and the Great Mosque is a Unesco site.

Official news agency SANA reported Wednesday that terrorists from the al-Qaeda affiliated Jabhat an Nusra group detonated explosives at the base of the minaret, which then collapsed. The entire perimeter of the Great Mosque including the minaret had been in the hands of rebels from the Tawhid brigade, which is part of the Free Syrian Army. Syrian rebels accuse Assad loyalists, who tried to seize the mosque today after withdrawing a few months ago, of destroying the minaret.

According to anti-Assad activists who posted videos online, loyalist militias destroyed the minaret because it dominated the Aleppo citadel, which is controlled by Assad’s forces.

At least 7,837 children have been killed “by forces loyal to the Damascus regime” since the Syrian conflict began through April 6, the National Observatory on Human Rights made known on Wednesday. That number is 6,190, according to the Center for Documentation of Violations in Syria. According to the Observatory’s count, 2,343 were girls, 5,494 were boys, 1,930 were under 10 years old, and 348 were newborns. The cities with most child victims of the war are Aleppo (1,531) and Damascus (1,506). The children have been shot to death by snipers, executed in mass murders, and died under torture, the Observatory said. Children have been killed “in summary executions, their throats cut with knives, as in the May 25, 2012 massacre in the village of Houla near Homs” in which more than 100 people, most of them children, died. Others were “shot by snipers”, others still died “under torture”. Of an estimated 194,000 Syrians detained by government forces, over 9,000 are children. Assad’s forces have not spared them violent methods of torture, with no distinction between adults and minors”, the Observatory said. “Many former detainees have reported to activists that they heard children being tortured, screaming for their mothers and begging to be freed”, the Observatory reported.