Some children are still missing amid the rubble following a Wednesday (March 21st) airstrike in Idlib believed to have been carried out by the Syrian regime that killed more than 20 civilians, most of them children, activists said.

At least 16 children were killed when warplanes targeted the town of Kafr Batikh in western rural Idlib on Wednesday, activist Musab Assaf told Diyaruna, with the toll likely to rise as the search for missing persons continues.

"The warplanes flew at very low altitude and initially carried out a dummy airstrike that led some primary school students to rush to a nearby shelter -- a cave that was equipped for such incidences," he said.

"The warplanes then returned and targeted the shelter directly, collapsing and leveling it, which led to the high number of casualties," he said.

Most of the people in the shelter were killed and some children are still missing, Assaf said, with rubble removal and the search for victims ongoing.

Among the dead are 16 children, the oldest of whom was 11, he said. The rest were children between the ages of 7 and 9.

Also deceased are the father and mother of children who died in the airstrike, and a mother and her 2-year-old son, Assaf said.

"The targeted area is non-militarized," he said, noting that the adults who died in the airstrike had rushed to the site after being informed by observatories on social media that warplanes were headed to the area.

Olive branches and greenery

In Kafr Batikh, devastated families wrapped the bodies of their children in thick wool blankets, AFP reported.

They adorned their makeshift shrouds with olive branches and other greenery from trees in the village orchard before lowering them into graves deep in the red earth.

A teacher said he was in the school with students when a warplane launched strikes.

Abdulrahman al-Omar said the students were hurrying home when more bombing raids hit.

"Some elderly people brought them into a cave to take shelter," al-Omar said.

As rescue workers rushed to help the victims and clear away the bodies of the first strike, the warplane hit yet again, he said.

On Tuesday, an airstrike on a school in the opposition-held town of Arbin outside Damascus killed a number of children who were taking shelter in its basement.