Battle for Syria's Aleppo extends into 11th day with renewed fighting, bombings of rebel areas

BEIRUT - Activists are reporting renewed bombardments and clashes in rebel-held sectors of Syria's largest city, Aleppo, as fighting there stretches into its 11th day.

The battle for Aleppo, Syria's commercial hub with around 3 million inhabitants, has now lasted longer than the rebel assault on the capital Damascus that regime troops crushed earlier in July.

The Britain-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said on Tuesday that the rebel bastion of Sakhour in the northeast of Aleppo was being shelled and that clashes had broken out between rebels and government forces elsewhere in the city.

The U.N. has estimated that 200,000 people have fled Aleppo during the fighting. Refugees that have made it to Turkey describe a city devastated by the shelling.