A car bomb explosion killed at least 20 people and wounded dozens more near a mosque in the Damascus province town of Suq Wadi Barada on Friday, a monitor said, according to the AFP news agency.
The town is under rebel control, but troops loyal to the regime of President Bashar Al-Assad were positioned right outside it, said the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights.
"At least three of the dead were children," said Observatory director Rami Abdel Rahman, according to AFP.
State news agency SANA also reported the blast, and blamed "terrorists," the term the Assad regime uses for rebels fighting to oust it.
"The car exploded while the terrorists were packing it with explosives near the Osama Bin Zeid mosque. Terrorists and civilians were killed," said the agency.
"Two bodies have arrived at the Moassat hospital, including a seven-year-old child's. There are also 30 wounded people, most of them critically," it added.
Anti-regime activists blamed Assad’s loyalists for the blast.
Amateur video shot after the explosion showed clouds of smoke rising above a burning car, while cries of men and women could be heard amid the chaos that followed the blast.
The footage also showed people carrying away casualties of the explosion.
A second video showed the bodies of the dead, some of them covered with blankets. Among the bodies shown in the footage was that of a child.
An unidentified activist filming the video blamed the attack on troops loyal to Assad.
"These are the bodies of some of the victims... of Assad's car bomb explosion in Suq Wadi Barada. God is greater than you, Bashar Al-Assad," he said, according to AFP.
Car bombings have plagued Syria in recent months, killing scores across the country.
On Wednesday night, Damascus and other parts of Syria went dark, as an explosion near the airport in the capital caused a blackout.
Power was reportedly cut after rebel artillery hit a gas pipeline.
Syria's 31-month conflict has killed more than 115,000 people, according to the Observatory.
(Arutz Sheva’s North American Desk is keeping you updated until the start of Shabbat in New York. The time posted automatically on all Arutz Sheva articles, however, is Israeli time.)