market in the Old City, which is a UNESCO World Heritage site. The mosque was heavily damaged in October 2012 just weeks after a fire gutted the old city's famed market.

North of Aleppo, a government airstrike on the village of Deir Jamal killed at least seven people, including five children, according to the Observatory. It was not immediately clear what the target was, but regime warplanes frequently carry out bombing runs on rebel-held towns.

Farther south, in the central city of Homs, the state news agency said a car bomb caused casualties and extensive material damage, but it did not elaborate.

An official in the Homs governor's office told The Associated Press that there were two blasts and that four people were killed and at least six wounded. The officialspoke on condition of anonymity in line with regulations.

With the bloodshed showing no sign of abating, the Syrian opposition has grown increasingly frustrated with what it sees as the international community's apathy toward the suffering on the ground.

On Thursday, the Syrian National Coalition, an opposition umbrella group, posted a statement on its Facebook page saying 72 bodies had been discovered in the village of Maalikiyah, south of Aleppo. It blamed the purported killings, which the SNC said took place on Feb. 25, on Assad's forces, and demanded that countries at the Rome conference "take a serious and firm position on the regime's crimes, which continue to cast a dark shadow of failure and weakness on any international efforts sought to provide support to the Syrian people."