Distressing footage of a crying man consoling a distraught little boy has emerged from the hellish final hours of the battle for the Syrian city of Aleppo.

Holding the toddler in his arms, the man, whose eyes are red from crying, tries to tell the child his father won’t be coming back as he repeatly asks for “baba.”

“Daddy went to heaven,” the man says, identified by a local journalist as the baby’s uncle.

The heartbreaking video is just one of thousands of similiar stories occuring in the embattled city right now as Syrian President Bashar al-Assad’s forces regain control of the rebel-held east side of Aleppo after four years of fighting.

Regime bombing has been relentless in the past few days. Videos of the wounded and dying lying in the street during shelling have horrified people around the world. The Syrian Observatory for Human Rights estimates that 415 civilians have been killed in regime air strike in the last month.

Several activists in the city recorded ‘farewell messages’ during which explosions and the whirr of warplanes and helicopters could be heard in the background.

Between 50,000 - 100,000 people, among them al-Qaeda linked rebels, were thought to remain in the last pockets of rebel resistance to the regime on Tuesday.

In pictures: Children play underground in Syria Show all 8 1 /8 In pictures: Children play underground in Syria In pictures: Children play underground in Syria A child plays in the ball pit at the 'Land of Childhood,' an underground playground in a besieged town in Syria Unicef In pictures: Children play underground in Syria Abdulaziz, 10, plays in the 'Land of Childhood' underground playground in Syria Unicef In pictures: Children play underground in Syria Boys look through a show window inside the tunnel that provides a safe passage for children between the two basements that form the 'Land of Childhood' in a besieged town in Syria Unicef In pictures: Children play underground in Syria Children play at the underground 'Land of Childhood' in a besieged town in Syria Unicef In pictures: Children play underground in Syria Two girls play at the 'Land of Childhood' underground playground in a besieged town in Syria Unicef In pictures: Children play underground in Syria Children on the ride on a ferris wheel at the 'Land of Childhood', an underground playground in a besieged town in Syria Unicef In pictures: Children play underground in Syria Seven-year-old Massa at the "Land of Childhood" underground playground in a besieged town in Syria Unicef In pictures: Children play underground in Syria Children wait in line to buy sweets at the 'Land of Childhood,' an underground playground in a besieged town in Syria Unicef

For those who avoid death in the rubble of aerial attacks, there is a fresh threat in the form of government allied Shia militias, who reportedly executed 82 civilians, including 11 women and 13 children, overnight on Monday. Unicef said 100 children were trapped without family members in a building under fire from government forces on Tuesday afternoon.

Many non-combatant activists including the doctors and aid workers left in the rebel enclave fear detention or execution at the hands of the regime, as has been the case in several other instances in Syria’s bloody civil war.