At least 20 people have been killed in air strikes in the northern Syrian city of Aleppo, a monitoring group has said.

The UK-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights (SOHR) said on Wednesday that at least 10 people were killed in strikes targeting the Bayan hospital in an opposition-held part of Aleppo city.

Nine newborns were removed from their incubators after the aerial assault that also damaged equipment, according to the Independent Doctors' Association in Syria, which runs the hospital.

"There are only a handful of functioning incubators left in Aleppo," Dr Hatem, director of the hospital, said.

"Our ability to provide even the most basic protections to our most vulnerable is disappearing. Every world leader must imagine that one of these newborns were their own son or daughter.

"Whatever they would do to protect their own children they need to afford the same protection for ours."

In al-Marjeh neighborhood, at least four people, including two children, were killed when regime helicopters dropped barrel bombs.

One more person was killed in an air strike in the nearby neighborhood of al-Moadi, the SOHR added.

Zouhir al-Shimale, a local journalist, told Al Jazeera that the hospital is located on a very busy street.

"There is a vegetable market on that street. It is a very busy area. At least four barrel bombs were dropped by regime helicopters. So far the death toll we have received is 10, with another 30 people injured.

"In addition to that, air strikes have targeted al-Salhin neighborhood, one person has been killed and several others have been injured. In al-Rashdin neighborhood, an air strike left one woman killed," al-Shimale said.

'Distressed and paralyzed'

At least 17 medical facilities have been attacked in the past two months, according to independent reports, and there are now only seven hospitals left functioning in Aleppo.

“After a week of intense attacks that have left dozens of civilians killed, Aleppo is now facing its first taste of siege," said Dr Osama Abo al Ezz, a surgeon from the Syrian American Medical Society working in Aleppo.

"We are distressed and paralyzed. Yet international demands for civilian protection are not being backed up by any tangible action.”

PHOTO CAPTION

A view shows the damage at al-Quds hospital after it was hit by airstrikes, in anopposition-held area of Syria's Aleppo.... April 28, 2016

Al-Jazeera