Around eight people died and 16 others were injured in a bomb blast which hit a bus in Syria’s Homs early Tuesday, according to the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights.

The blast rocked a street in Akrama neighbourhood, that is mostly inhabited by Alawite - a syncretic sect of Shia Islam, and a pro-government minority.

The so-called Islamic State (ISIS) claimed the attack, saying the blast killed 11 members of the Syrian army, according to ISIS official news agency AMAQ.

Footage released by state media shows people crowding around the burned shell of a vehicle in the middle of a street.

This bombing is not the first of its type, with a string of bombings hitting many Syrian cities that are controlled by the Assad’s regime government, including the capital Damascus.

Many of them were claimed by ISIS and others were claimed by the Tahrir al-Sham alliance - led by fighters formerly linked to Al-Qaeda.

The conflict in Syria had killed at least 340,000 people since 2011, when people went to the streets in peaceful protests against strongman President Bashar Al Assad and his government regime, but his crackdown paved the way for a fully-fledged war, which has forced some 11 million Syrians to flee their homes.