Blood splattered on the floor. Bodies shot to the ground. Civilians trapped in an area that's just a few square miles wide. This has been the scene in Aleppo in the past 72 hours.
That's when British MPs decided to hold an emergency debate on December 13 to discuss what the international community can do to protect civilians in eastern Aleppo. Only a handful of officials actually showed up.
The House of Commons was almost entirely empty, with only a small number of government officials seated in the room. The Prime Minister was not among them.
"While Aleppo was rapidly being transformed into one mass grave today, it was shameful to see so many empty spaces during the Syria debate in the Commons," Kristyan Benedict, Amnesty International UK's Syrian Campaign Manager, told >The Independent.
"Anyone in Syria who sees images of those empty green leather benches will be entitled to think that large numbers of British MPs have essentially given up on trying to help them.”
The last 72 hours in Aleppo have been a nightmare as government forces took control of the city, which has been at the epicenter of the Syrian civil war.
Around 80,000 civilians were trapped in the crammed area including many children who were left unattended.
"According to alarming reports from a doctor in the city, many children, possibly more than 100, unaccompanied or separated from their families, are trapped in a building under heavy attack in east Aleppo," said Geert Cappelaere, UNICEF regional director, according to Al Jazeera.