ISIS car bomb kills at least 6 in Syrian capital

A car bomb in a district south of Damascus killed at least six people and possibly many more on Monday, according to ISIS militants who claimed responsibility for the attack.

Theultra-hardlineSunni group's attack near a Syrian army checkpoint had killed or injured 48 people, a news agency close to the militants said.

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Lebanese groupHezbollah'sAlManartelevision reported the blast was at an army checkpoint and put the death toll at eight.

The British-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights also said eight people had been killed and the toll was expected to rise because of the number of people with serious injuries.

State media said the bombing was on the outskirts ofSayyidaZeinab, home to Syria's holiestShiaMuslim shrine.

The area has already been hit by two bomb attacks this year. Multiple explosions in February killed scores of people in one of the bloodiest attacks in that area in Syria's five-year conflict, and an ISIS suicide attack there less than a month earlier killed 70 people.

Syrian government negotiatorBasharJa'afarisaid Monday's blast "that four terrorists carried out" had hit a hospital, killing some patients evacuated last week from two rebel-besieged towns in the northwestern province ofIdlib.

Separately, rebel shelling of government-held parts of the northern city of Aleppo killed at least 18 people, the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said.

Syrian aerial bombing has killed dozens of civilians in Aleppo's residential area ofBustanalQasrand areas under the control of rebels in the last few days, it said.

The government says it is planning a campaign to take areas of Aleppo under rebel control and to cut off their only remaining route into the city.