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Amman/Beirut. Syrian government forces attacked opponents of President Bashar al-Assad on several fronts on Tuesday, sending residents fleeing from one town near the capital and bombarding Homs for an 11th straight day, activists said.

Homs faces a humanitarian crisis. Food and fuel are scarce in the city of 1 million people, Syria’s third-largest, and most shops are shut due to relentless shelling and rocket fire that have trapped people in their homes.

With Assad oblivious to international condemnation of the tactics employed to crush the uprising against his 11-year rule, Arab countries led by Saudi Arabia pushed for a new resolution at the United Nations supporting their peace plan.

The redoubled diplomatic effort came as the UN human rights chief chastised the Security Council for failing to act on Syria, saying Assad had been emboldened by its failure to condemn him.

“I am particularly appalled by the ongoing onslaught on Homs ... According to credible accounts, the Syrian army has shelled densely populated neighborhoods of Homs in what appears to be an indiscriminate attack on civilian areas,” UN High Commissioner for Human Rights Navi Pillay told the General Assembly in New York on Monday.

The Russian- and Iranian-backed Assad, whose Alawite-minority family has ruled the mainly Sunni Muslim country for 42 years, is struggling to put down street demonstrations and stop insurgent attacks across the country.

He dismisses his opponents as terrorists backed by enemy nations in a regional power-play and says he will introduce reforms on his own terms.

Conflict flared anew on Tuesday in Rankous, a town near Damascus that was hit by government shelling. Activist Ibn Al-Kalmoun said phone lines had been cut and many residents had fled.

In Homs, the heart of the 11-month-old uprising, the pro-opposition neighborhood of Baba Amro was struck at dawn by the heaviest shelling in five days, the Syria Observatory for Human Rights said.

Activist Hussein Nader said it was not possible to go to the streets to survey the damage or look for casualties.

“They are hitting the same spots several consecutive times, making venturing out there impossible. The shelling was heavy in the morning and now it is one rocket every 15 minutes or so,” Hussein said by satellite phone.

Mohammad al-Mohammad, a doctor at a makeshift hospital in Baba Amro, appeared in a video with a wounded youth he said was shot by sniper in his side.

“The bullet ended up in the stomach. This is a critical condition that needs transportation to a proper hospital,” the doctor said. “We appeal to anyone with conscience to intervene to stop the massacres of Bashar al-Assad and his cohorts.”

Shelling was also reported in Rastan early on Tuesday.

Foreign media have had to rely on activists’ accounts of the situation because the Syrian government restricts access, although reports from neutral organizations such as the International Committee of the Red Cross and Human Rights Watch confirm the general picture of widespread violence.

At the United Nations, diplomats said a draft General Assembly resolution which supported an Arab League plan and called for the appointment of a joint UN-Arab League envoy on Syria could be put to a vote today or Thursday.

The resolution is similar to a Security Council draft vetoed by Russia and China on Feb. 4 that condemned the Assad government and called on him to step aside. There are no vetoes in General Assembly votes and its decisions are not legally binding.

“The situation on the ground is unbearable,” said the Qatari president of the General Assembly, Nassir Abdulaziz al-Nasser.

Reuters