Brave Syrian Twitter star, 7, reveals she is injured and ‘on the run’ after airstrike destroyed her Aleppo home
United Nations issues ‘chilling report’ of 16,000 people trying to get out as ground battle moves into neighbourhoods
A SCHOOL girl from rebel-held Aleppo - who shot to fame tweeting about the bloodbath unfolding around her - has survived horrendous bombing but is left wounded.
Bana Alabed, 7, has been tweeting to the world from the war-torn Syrian city about life under Russian and Syrian bombardment in the besieged east of the city.
She now has 167K followers - including Harry Potter author JK Rowling - all of whom have been worried about her safety as regime forces accelerate their campaign to crush the rebels.
Capturing eastern Aleppo would be the biggest victory for President Bashar al-Assad since the start of the uprising against him in 2011, restoring his control over what had been a major rebel stronghold.
He has been backed by Russian leader Vladimir Putin who has deployed a flotilla of warships which have been unleashing a blitz which has destroyed little Bana's house.
Related stories
Then on Sunday, Bana's mum Fatemah tweeted:"Last message - under heavy bombardments now, can't be alive anymore.
When we die, keep talking for 200,000 still inside.
"#BYE.- Fatemah."
Then it went quiet, with followers wondering what had happened.
But last night she tweeted she was alive.
She said: “We have no home now. I got minor injury. I didn't sleep since yesterday, I am hungry. I want to live, I don't want to die. - Bana .”
This followed seven hours after her mum, Fatemah tweeted that they were on the run in Aleppo and that people were being slaughtered around them.
Before they were bombed, Bana filmed cowering near her bed as missiles and bombs rain down.
In a tweet she pleads: “Someone save me now please.
“Hiding in the bed.”
Just an hour before she tweeted a photograph of a dead girl.
The disturbing photograph shows the child’s head covered in concrete dust with a pool of her blood underneath.
In accompanying message, Bana says: “Oh dear world, I am crying tonight, this is my friend killed by a bomb tonight.
“I can’t stop crying.”
Last week her mother tweeted JK Rowling to ask if she could send the books over for her to read.
The author wrote back: "Bana, I hope you do read the book, because I think you'd like it. Sending you lots and lots of love xxx".
Fatemah, explained: "She wants to but we don't have it here. We watched the movie before. How do we get?"
Books are hard to come by in war-torn Aleppo, and Rowling initially thought there would be no way she could send over books: "I do know that, sadly. I would love to send Bana a book if I could."
But her team were able to send the Harry Potter series over the internet for he to read.
Rowling has also been retweeting Bana's messages to her 8.7million followers.
She has also tweeted her backing for urgent help for the people of Aleppo.
It is estimated that more than 200,000 people are trapped in the city.
The United Nations said today that at least 16,000 were attempting to flee in “chilling” circumstances.
UN humanitarian chief Stephen O'Brien said: "The intensity of attacks on eastern Aleppo neighbourhoods over the past few days has forced thousands of civilians to flee to other parts of the city.”
We pay for your stories! Do you have a story for The Sun Online news team? Email us at [email protected] or call 0207 782 4368