On 6 September 2012 Kurdish activists reported that 21 civilians were killed in the Kurdish neighborhood of Sheikh Maqsud in Aleppo, when the Syrian Army shelled the local mosque and its surroundings. Despite the district being neutral during the Battle of Aleppo and free of government and FSA clashes, local residents believed that the district was shelled as retaliation for sheltering anti-government civilians from other parts of the city. In a statement released shortly after the deaths, the Kurdish People's Protection Units (YPG) vowed to retaliate.[111] A few days later, Kurdish forces killed 3 soldiers in Afrin (Kurdish: Efrîn‎) and captured a number of other government soldiers in Ayn al-Arab (Kurdish: Kobanî‎) and Al-Malikiyah (Kurdish: Dêrika Hemko‎) from where they drove the remaining government security forces.