3,300 Killed since January in Syria Rebel-Jihadist Fighting

Some 3,300 people have been killed in fighting between rebels seeking President Bashar Assad's ouster and their erstwhile jihadist allies since clashes erupted in January, a monitoring group said Wednesday.

"Some 3,300 people have been killed ever since the start of fighting on January 3 between the (jihadist) Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant (ISIL) on one side, and (rebel) Islamist and other groups on the other," said the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights.

The deaths came "in car and (other) bomb attacks, suicide blasts and fighting," said the Britain-based Observatory, which relies on activists and other sources inside Syria.

While rebels initially welcomed ISIL's jihadists in their battle to overthrow Assad, much of the opposition later turned against the group, accusing it of hijacking the rebellion and carrying out a string of kidnappings and killings of activists and rival rebels.

Among the fatalities were at least 281 civilians, the majority of them killed by shelling and stray bullets, the Observatory said.

Twenty-one civilians were executed in a children's hospital-turned-ISIL prison in the northern city of Aleppo, it said, adding that a family of seven Kurds was also executed by the jihadists.