(Adds rebel statement and state media interviews with residents)
BEIRUT, May 13 (Reuters) - Insurgents killed at least 19 civilians believed to be from families of fighters loyal to the Syrian government after capturing an Alawite village from government control in western Syria on Thursday, a monitoring group said.
Residents from the village of al-Zara interviewed by state media said rebels had killed women, children and livestock. The rebels said they had abided by the rules of war.
Dozens of people are still missing, believed to have been abducted from the village, which lies close to a main highway linking the western cities of Homs and Hama, the Britain-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said on Friday.
The Observatory said the attackers included major Islamist rebel group Ahrar al-Sham and the al Qaeda-affiliated Nusra Front.
An Ahrar al-Sham official could not be reached by phone and did not immediately respond to a text message from Reuters seeking comment.
The 19 dead, who included six women, are believed to have been killed as rebels stormed houses during their attack on al-Zara, said the Observatory, which monitors the war through a network of sources.
An image shared on social media claimed to show rebel fighters next to the bodies of two women in al-Zara.
Responding to the image, an alliance of rebel groups behind the attack said the women had been killed because they were armed and opened fire during what it called the "liberation" of al-Zara.
A statement from the Homs Operations Room said responding to fire regardless of its source was justified "according to Islamic rules and ethics of war".
HIDING IN THE ATTIC
Government forces trying to re-take the Alawite village have used air strikes and barrel bombs. The government and their allies were still fighting insurgents nearby, the monitoring group said.
The Alawites are a minority sect, an offshoot of Shi'ite Islam. Syrian President Bashar al-Assad is an Alawite.
At least eight of the rebels had been killed, the Observatory said. The insurgents had also captured government fighters.
Syrian state TV broadcast interviews with men and children who had fled the attack. They said rebels killed women, children and elderly people, slaughtered livestock and destroyed houses as they attacked.
"I saw armed men coming into houses, they started fighting and destroying things. So I hid in the attic and waited there...," said Isa Rai, a young boy interviewed by Syrian television. "Then at night I came out when the army reached us."
A man, who said he hid in his attic with his family from 4am until 9pm, added: "They are liars, they have a truce in words only, there is nothing of the sort on the ground."
A Feb. 27 cessation of hostilities agreement brokered by the United States and Russia reduced violence in western Syria for a short time. It has been reduced to tatters, however, by increased fighting in the city of Aleppo and other areas.
The village of al-Zara is about 35 km (22 miles) north of Homs and a similar distance south of Hama.
Government forces and their allies have battled insurgents around the highway between the two cities, and towns in the area were among the first hit when Russia's air force intervened in the Syrian war last September.
The Observatory said the insurgent attack was part of an assault they called "revenge for Aleppo", a reference to the northern city where an escalation of violence by both government aligned forces and insurgents has killed scores of people in recent weeks.
(Reporting by Lisa Barrington and Tom Perry; Editing by Toby Davis) ((lisa.barrington@thomsonreuters.com; +961)(0)(1954456;))
Keywords: MIDEAST CRISIS/SYRIA VILLAGE
