Turkey has sent a formal request to NATO and allies for assistance in dealing with the aftermath of the earthquake

President Joe Biden will speak with Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan “very soon,” the White House said Monday, as Turkey reels from a devastating earthquake that left thousands dead and at least 14,000 people injured. 

 The two leaders last spoke in person at the G20 summit in November.

The death toll across Turkey and Syria has risen to at least 2,724 after a powerful 7.8 magnitude earthquake rocked Turkey and Syria early Monday. 

The total number of injured climbed to 13,580, based on information provided by various agencies. Turkey has at least 11,119 injured people and Syria has 2,461 injured people following the quake.

The total death toll in Syria rose to 1,073. News agency SANA reports 593 across government-controlled areas and the “White Helmets” group, officially known as the Syria Civil Defense, reported 480 deaths in opposition-controlled areas.

The total death toll in Turkey has climbed to 1,651, according to Turkey’s Vice President Fuat Oktay. 

This is CNN journalist Eyad Kourdi’s first-hand account of experiencing the 7.8 magnitude earthquake in Gaziantep, Turkey:

It was just after 4:15 a.m. and my parents woke up in terror, screaming as the ground shook underneath us. I shouted at them to take cover. “It’s going to be over soon, it’s going to be over soon,” I yelled, even as it felt like it would never end.

I wasn’t too worried at first. It’s just another minor earthquake, the kind we feel every couple of months around here, I thought. But just a few seconds later, it became so shaky that furniture was falling over and I could hear objects smashing. The force felt like somebody trying to knock me over, I could feel the violent reverberations in my chest. I fell to the ground. The shaking kept going. It was minutes before it finally stopped.

We ran out of the house, in our pajamas and slippers. It was freezing cold and pouring down with rain. There was snow on the ground. The whole neighborhood was in the streets.

I rushed back inside to grab some coats and proper boots and we jumped into a car to move into an open area, away from the buildings. I heard ambulances and fire trucks heading into the old town, which is full of older, more fragile structures.

The aftershocks kept coming during the day. Some were unbelievably strong. One struck when I was right next to a badly damaged large building. A civil defense official shouted at everybody to run.

Later, I drove to Pazarcık, a town of 35,000 people that’s closer to the epicenter. It felt like Armageddon. There’s at least one completely destroyed building in every single street.

I stayed in Pazarcık for 30 minutes and, in that short time, I felt four aftershocks. It didn’t seem safe to stay, so I drove back to Gaziantep.

That’s when the ground started trembling again. It felt biblical. Everybody ran out of their cars. The shaking was so strong that I was barely able to stay on my feet. The water in the ditch next to the road was violently thrashing back and forth like in a storm.

In Gaziantep, we are sheltering inside a mosque where it’s safer than in our house. Municipal workers have been distributing water, bread and warm rice.

I know it would be even safer to stay outside, in case there are more aftershocks. But the temperature is just above freezing. My parents can’t stay in the open.

Eyad Kourdi reported from Gaziantep and Ivana Kottasova wrote from London.

Several archeological sites in Syria were damaged following the powerful earthquake that shook the region on Monday morning, according to Syria’s Directorate-General for Antiquities and Museums (DGAM).

The 13th century Aleppo Citadel “suffered minor and moderate damage in which parts of the Ottoman mill fell, [there is] cracking and falling of parts of the northeast defensive fences. Large parts of the dome of the lighthouse of the Ayubi Mosque also fell, the entrances to the castle were damaged, and parts of the stone, including the entrance of the royal defense tower, and the front of the Ottoman refuge were damaged”, DGAM said in a Facebook post.

Syria’s once-storied, ancient city of Aleppo in the country’s northwest was seriously damaged in the ongoing civil war, but reopened in 2018 after reconstruction work DGAM says that artifacts inside the National Museum in Aleppo were damaged in Monday’s earthquake.

DGAM also reports damage to historical buildings and mosques in the Hama Governorate in western-central Syria, such as cracks in the structure and collapsed walls in the Imam Ismail Mosque and the Shmemis Castle.

The Al-Marqab Castle, a Crusader fortress near Baniyas, in Northwest Syria, also suffered damage, including the collapse of a block from one of its circular towers. “The tremor also led to the fall of the rock cliff in the vicinity of the Qadous Castle and the collapse of some residential buildings situated in the castle’s campus,” DGAM said.

Experts are still studying the full extent of the damage to the historical sites and surrounding historical buildings and neighborhoods. DGAM says it has not received “accurate information” about damage in the city of Homs. 

The death toll across Turkey and Syria has risen to at least 2,701 after a powerful 7.8 magnitude earthquake rocked southern Turkey early Monday. 

The total number of injured in Turkey and Syria climbed to 13,572 on Monday. 

The total death toll in Syria rose to 1,050. New agency SANA reports 570 deaths across government-controlled areas and the “White Helmets” group, officially known as the Syria Civil Defense, reported 480 deaths in opposition-controlled areas.

The total death toll in Turkey has climbed to 1,651, according to Turkey’s Vice President Fuat Oktay. There are now 9,733 people injured in Turkey, Oktay also said. 

At least 11,119 people have been injured in Turkey and 2,453 have been injured in Syria following the earthquake.

Ten units of the Russian army with a total of more than 300 soldiers are involved in clearing debris and helping in search and rescue operations in Syria following devastating earthquake and aftershocks in the country, the Russian defense ministry said in a statement on Monday.  

Russian Defense Minister Sergei Shoigu “instructed the commander of the Russian (forces) in Syria to provide assistance,” according to the statement. 

The ministry said that Russian soldiers are mainly assisting in the cities of Aleppo, Hama and Latakia. 

The servicemen are clearing debris, searching for victims and providing them with medical assistance, the statement said. 

Earlier on Monday, Russian President Vladimir Putin pledged assistance to Turkey and Syria in the aftermath of the deadly earthquake. 

Some background: Russia is the strongest foreign power operating in Syria, and Putin has long allied himself with Syrian President Bashar al-Assad, throwing the full weight of the Russian military behind the Syrian Army. 

Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan declared seven days of national mourning due to the earthquake.

In addition to US personnel on the ground, the US is “in the process of deploying additional teams, including two 79-person urban search and rescue teams to support Turkish search and rescue efforts,” National Security Council coordinator for strategic communications John Kirby said.

The United States Agency for International Development and the Pentagon are “now coordinating” with their Turkish counterparts on assistance.

Turkish Health Minister Fahrettin Koca said the death toll climbed to 1,651 in southern Turkey after the devastating earthquake on Monday. 

Koca also said 11,199 people were injured across 10 provinces of Turkey.