Aleppo (AINA) -- A suicide car bomber detonated his bomb in front of an Assyrian charity complex in Aleppo on Sunday. No one was hurt in the explosion but there was heavy damage to complex, which includes a home for the elderly, a hospital and a grammar school. The Assyrian Archbishop of Aleppo issued the following statement:

On Sunday 21st October 2012, a suicidal booby trapped car exploded early in the morning in the main roundabout of the New Syriac-Assyrian district. It left huge craters and considerable amount of damage to the Beth Hasda Complex, a Syrian Orthodox' charitable endowment, which includes an elderly Home, al-Kalima Grammar School and a Hospital. This is the second incident in less than twenty-four hours to inflict suffering to our humanitarian institutions in Aleppo.

Thank God that the damage sustained was only material and no precious lives were lost. Naturally, the fear, traumatization and horror this explosion imposed on the vulnerable elderly, recovering injured, convalescing patients, and dedicated, overstretched medical staff of these institutions are incalculable.

We unreservedly condemn and denounce the escalation of these armed manifestations, and all kinds of shelling and explosions that can only lead entrenched combatant brothers deeper into this vicious circle of violence, devastation and death.

We also condemn and deplore the continuation of kidnapping, killings, demolition of infrastructure, heritages and the attrition activities aimed at the crippling of the local and national economy.

The status quo of this conflict is apparent and demoralizing as it can only spiral to propagate the culture of anarchy, resentment and disunity, in a city which has never knowingly sustained such level of violence, destruction and decimation in its history. Until recently, we only knew affection, tolerance and a healthy co-existence of the people in our blessed city.

It is heartbreaking to helplessly witness our beloved city of Aleppo and other Syrian cities, villages and hamlets becoming battlefields, and to see their systematic obliteration.

No one can raise the flag of victory over the heaps of such ruins and sacrilege.

Therefore, we wholeheartedly call on you all to join us in prayer in support of all internal and external efforts and endeavors to achieve a lasting cease-fire. To pray for peace and re-consolidate our shaken pillars of harmony and trust, and to hold love, security and national unity as holy aims of our Syrian solidarity.

Let us hope that the blessed Eid al-Adha will bring about truce and concord to all citizen and that Syria will be able to enjoy tranquility and calmness once again.

We wish that our homeland and all citizens will enjoy every Eid, the blessings of God and the graces of Peace.