Syria’s interim president has said it is his “priority” to protect the country’s Druze citizens, after Israel vowed to destroy government forces it accused of attacking members of the religious minority in Suweida province.
In his first televised statement since Israel’s air strikes on Damascus on Wednesday, Ahmed al-Sharaa also warned that Syrians were not afraid of war.
Syrian state media reported that the military was withdrawing from Suweida under a ceasefire agreement with Druze leaders. But it is not clear whether that will hold.
More than 350 people are reported to have been killed since sectarian clashes between Druze militias and Bedouin tribes erupted in the province on Sunday.
The government responded by deploying its forces to the predominantly Druze city of Suweida for the first time since Sharaa’s Sunni Islamist group led the rebel offensive that overthrew President Bashar al-Assad in December, ending 13 years of civil war.
However, the fighting escalated and government forces were accused by residents and activists of killing Druze civilians and carrying out extrajudicial executions.
The Druze religion is an offshoot of Shia Islam with its own unique identity and beliefs. In addition to Syria, there are sizeable communities of Druze in Lebanon, Jordan, Israel and the occupied Golan Heights.
Syrian Druze and other minorities have remained suspicious of Sharaa since he took power because of his jihadist past. His Islamist group, Hayat Tahrir al-Sham (HTS), is a former al-Qaeda affiliate that is still designated as a terrorist organisation by the UN.
Their fears have been heightened by several outbreaks of deadly sectarian violence, including one in May between Druze militias, security forces and allied Islamist fighters that also prompted Israel intervene militarily.
In his speech early on Thursday, Sharaa stressed that the Druze were “a fundamental part of the fabric of this nation”, and that he rejected any attempt for them to be dragged into the hands of what he called “an external party”.
The president said government forces deployed to Suweida had “succeeded in restoring stability and expelling outlawed factions despite the Israeli interventions”, which he said caused a “significant complication of the situation” and “a large-scale escalation”.
“We are not among those who fear the war. We have spent our lives facing challenges and defending our people, but we have put the interests of the Syrians before chaos and destruction,” he said.
Responsibility for security in Suweida would now be handed to religious elders and some local factions “based on the supreme national interest”, he added.
Sharaa ended the speech by promising that the government was “keen on holding accountable those who transgressed and abused our Druze people”.
On Wednesday, Israel’s Prime Minister, Benjamin Netanyahu, told the country’s own Druze citizens that Israeli forces were “acting to save our Druze brothers and to eliminate the gangs of the regime”.
The Israeli military said its aircraft struck the Syrian military’s headquarters in Damascus and a military site near the presidential palace, as well as armoured vehicles on their way to Suweida, and firing posts and weapons storage facilities in southern Syria.
“We are acting decisively to prevent the entrenchment of hostile elements beyond the border, to protect the citizens of the State of Israel, and to prevent the harming of Druze civilians,” the military’s chief of staff, Lt Gen Eyal Zamir, said during a visit to the Golan Heights.
“We will not allow southern Syria to become a terror stronghold,” he warned.
The general also said there was “no room for disorder near the border fence”, after hundreds of Druze crossed the heavily fortified frontier with Syria on Wednesday.
The US Secretary of State, Marco Rubio, said it was speaking to all of the parties involved and had “agreed on specific steps that will bring this troubling and horrifying situation to an end”.
“This will require all parties to deliver on the commitments they have made and this is what we fully expect them to do,” he added, without giving any details.
The Syrian Observatory for Human Rights (SOHR), a UK-based monitoring group, says more than 350 people have been killed since Sunday.
They include 79 Druze fighters and 55 civilians, 27 of whom were summarily killed by interior ministry and defence ministry forces, according to the group.
At least 189 members of the government forces and 18 Bedouin tribal fighters have also been killed in the clashes, it says.
It was not immediately possible to verify the SOHR’s casualty figures, but Syrian security sources also said Wednesday that the death toll was close to 300.
