Video of children narrowly avoiding blast highlights plight of Syrian youth

Over 11,000 children have been killed in Syria’s civil war, a report by a British think tank claimed this week, as shocking footage emerged of a group of kids narrowly missing getting hit by a mortar shell.

From the video, posted online Sunday, it appears of all the children escaped unharmed from the shelling east of Damascus.

The report, by the Oxford Research Group, found that 11,420 children aged 17 and under have been slain in Syria’s civil war, including over 7,500 killed in explosions.

“All conflict parties need to take responsibility for the protection of children, and ultimately find a peaceful solution for the war itself,” co-author Hana Salama said in a statement.

The report also found that 764 children were summarily executed and 389 killed by sniper fire.

Little information was available about the attack on Jobar, which the children were filmed narrowly escaping. There were no reports of casualty figures after the shelling, a near-daily occurrence in Jobar, a rebel-held area that has been pummeled by regime forces in recent months.

In the video the children are seen on a bombed-out street talking about past close calls with bombs, when they are forced to duck for cover as a large explosion hits.

“We were scared the first time, but then we got used to it,” one child says just before the blast.

A later shot shows the children inside, seemingly unhurt, and the interviewer joking with them that they knew what to do.

“We can see you taking cover in the video, don’t deny it,” the interviewer says to one of the kids.

In June, the UN said over 6,500 children had been killed in the war, which has claimed more than 100,000 lives. Over a million children have fled the conflict, according to UN numbers.