Syria announces ceasefire after latest outbreak of deadly sectarian violence
The latest escalation under Syria's new leaders began with tit-for-tat kidnappings and attacks between local Sunni Bedouin tribes and Druze armed factions in the southern province, a center of the Druze community.
Syrian government forces, sent to restore order on Monday, also clashed with Druze armed groups.
On Tuesday, Syrian Defense Minister Murhaf Abu Qasra said an agreement was struck with the city's 'notables and dignitaries' and that government forces would 'respond only to the sources of fire and deal with any targeting by outlaw groups.' However, scattered clashes continued after his announcement — as did allegations that security forces had committed violations against civilians.
Syria's Interior Ministry said Monday that more than 30 people had been killed, but has not updated the figures since. The Syrian Observatory for Human Rights, a UK-based war monitor, said Tuesday that 166 people had been killed since Sunday, including five women and two children.
Among them were 21 people killed in 'field executions' by government forces, including 12 men in a rest house in the city of Sweida, it said. It did not say how many of the dead were civilians and also cited reports of members of the security forces looting and setting homes on fire.
Syrian interim President Ahmad al-Sharaa said in a statement that he had tasked authorities with 'taking immediate legal action against anyone proven to have committed a transgression or abuse, regardless of their rank or position.' Associated Press journalists in Sweida province saw forces at a government checkpoint searching cars and confiscating suspected stolen goods from both civilians and soldiers.
Israeli airstrikes targeted government forces' convoys heading into the provincial capital of Sweida and in other areas of southern Syria.
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and Defense Minister Israel Katz said the strikes sought to 'prevent the Syrian regime from harming' the Druze religious minority 'and to ensure disarmament in the area adjacent to our borders with Syria.' In Israel, the Druze are seen as a loyal minority and often serve in the armed forces.
Meanwhile, Israeli Cabinet member and Minister of Diaspora Affairs Amichai Chikli called on X for al-Sharaa to be 'eliminated without delay." Manhal Yasser Al-Gor, of the Interior Ministry forces, was being treated for shrapnel wounds at a local hospital after an Israeli strike hit his convoy.
'We were entering Sweida to secure the civilians and prevent looting. I was on an armored personnel carrier when the Israeli drone hit us," he said, adding that there were 'many casualties.' The Syrian Foreign Ministry said Israeli strikes had killed 'several innocent civilians' as well as soldiers, and called them 'a reprehensible example of ongoing aggression and external interference" in Syria's internal matters.
It said the Syrian state is committed to protecting the Druze, 'who form an integral part of the national identity and united Syrian social fabric.' Israel has taken an aggressive stance toward Syria's new leaders since al-Sharaa's Sunni Islamist insurgents ousted former President Bashar Assad in December, saying it doesn't want militants near its borders. Israeli forces have seized a UN-patrolled buffer zone on Syrian territory along the border with the Golan Heights and launched hundreds of airstrikes on military sites in Syria.
Earlier Tuesday, religious leaders of the Druze community in Syria called for armed factions that have been clashing with government forces to surrender their weapons and cooperate with authorities. One of the main Druze spiritual leaders later released a video statement retracting the call.
Sheikh Hikmat Al-Hijri, who has been opposed to the government in Damascus, said in the video that the initial Druze leaders' statement had been issued after an agreement with the authorities in Damascus but that 'they broke the promise and continued the indiscriminate shelling of unarmed civilians.' 'We are being subjected to a total war of annihilation,' he claimed, without offering evidence.
Some videos on social media showed armed fighters with Druze captives, beating them and, in some cases, forcibly shaving men's moustaches.
The Druze religious sect began as a 10th-century offshoot of Ismailism, a branch of Shiite Islam. More than half the roughly 1 million Druze worldwide live in Syria. Most of the other Druze live in Lebanon and Israel, including in the Golan Heights, which Israel captured from Syria in the 1967 Mideast War and annexed in 1981.
Since Assad's fall, clashes have broken out several times between forces loyal to the new Syrian government and Druze fighters.
The latest fighting has raised fears of more sectarian violence. In March, an ambush on government forces by Assad loyalists in another part of Syria triggered days of sectarian and revenge attacks. Hundreds of civilians were killed, most of them members of Assad's minority Alawite sect. A commission was formed to investigate the attacks but no findings have been made public.
The videos and reports of soldiers' violations spurred outrage and protests by Druze communities in neighboring Lebanon, northern Israel and in the Israel-annexed Golan Heights, where the Israeli military said dozens of protesters had crossed the border into Syrian territory.
The violence drew international concern. The US envoy to Syria, Tom Barrack, called the violence 'worrisome on all sides' in a post on.
'We are attempting to come to a peaceful, inclusive outcome for Druze, Bedouin tribes, the Syrian government and Israeli forces,' he said. (AP)
Hashtags
Try Our AI Features
Explore what Daily8 AI can do for you:
Comments
No comments yet...
Related Articles
Korea Herald
an hour ago
- Korea Herald
Syria sets date for selection of new transitional parliament
DAMASCUS, Syria (AFP) -- Syrian authorities announced on Sunday that a new transitional parliament would be selected in September, with local electoral bodies picking two-thirds of the lawmakers and the country's interim president naming the rest. After toppling longtime ruler Bashar Assad in December after nearly 14 years of civil war, Syria's new authorities -- led by President Ahmed al-Sharaa -- dissolved the country's rubber-stamp legislature and adopted a temporary constitutional declaration to cover a five-year transition period. In June, a presidential decree established a 10-member committee to supervise the formation of local electoral bodies to select a new batch of lawmakers. State news agency SANA reported on Sunday that committee head Mohammed Taha al-Ahmad had met with Sharaa to discuss the process, later announcing plans for a new 210-seat parliament with 140 members chosen by the local bodies and 70 appointed by the president. "The election of members of the People's Assembly is expected to take place between 15-20 September," Ahmad was quoted as saying, vowing women would be represented in the process. Ahmad's committee presented Sharaa with the final plan for the selection process during a meeting on Saturday, according to a statement from the presidency. The local electoral bodies will be formed within about three weeks of the signing of the decree laying out the temporary system, SANA cited Ahmad as saying. After that, candidacies will open, with hopefuls given about a week to prepare their platforms before debates are held. The assembly will have a renewable mandate of 36 months, according to the constitutional declaration adopted in March. The declaration stated that the parliament would exercise legislative powers until a permanent constitution was adopted and new elections were held. When it was first announced, critics of the declaration warned it concentrated power in Sharaa's hands and failed to reflect the country's ethnic and religious diversity. The authorities' ability to maintain stability and security, particularly for minority groups, has been repeatedly called into question by periodic outbreaks of violence in which government forces and their allies have been implicated.
Korea Herald
2 hours ago
- Korea Herald
Hundreds demonstrate in protest-hit UK town
Hundreds of demonstrators from rival groups marched through a UK town on Sunday under tight police security amid tensions over anti-immigrant protests. It was the latest in a series of demonstrations in Epping, northeast of London, after an asylum seeker was charged earlier in July with three counts of sexual assault, including allegedly attempting to kiss a 14-year-old girl. But only about 400 people from rival groups demonstrated in the town, as police put in place a tight security operation, erecting barricades to keep them apart and banning the wearing of masks. Essex police said they had "a robust policing operation in place to protect our community and to deal swiftly with anyone intent on causing crime or violent disorder." Protestors gathered outside the Bell Hotel in the town, which has been used to house asylum seekers and refugees, despite pleas from the local council to close it down. "They're a threat. They don't know who they are, who they're allowing in these hotels, and basically they're putting everybody at danger," one protester, who identified herself only as Cathy, told Agence France-Presse. There was also a counterprotest by the organization Stand Up To Racism, who chanted "refugees are welcome here" and "Whose streets? Our streets." Three people were arrested Sunday but the protest went off "peacefully," Essex police said in a statement. The issue of thousands of irregular migrants arriving in small boats across the Channel, coupled with the UK's worsening economy, has triggered rising anger among some Britons. Such sentiments have been amplified by inflammatory messaging on social networks, fuelled by far-right activists. Almost exactly a year ago on July 29, 2024, three young girls were stabbed to death in a frenzied attack in northwestern Southport. The shocking killings stoked days of riots across the country after false reports that the killer -- a UK-born teenager whose family came to the country from Rwanda after the 1994 genocide -- was a migrant. Nearly 24,000 migrants have made the perilous journey across the Channel so far in 2025, the highest-ever tally at this point in a year. (AFP)
Korea Herald
a day ago
- Korea Herald
Macron goes alone on Palestine recognition
PARIS (Reuters) -- President Emmanuel Macron's announcement that France would become the first Western member of the UN Security Council to recognize a Palestinian state in September has caused diplomatic ructions from the Middle East through Europe to Washington. But it did not come out of the blue. When Macron visited the Egyptian town of Arish on the border with Gaza in April, he was struck by the mounting humanitarian crisis and made clear on his return home that Paris would soon opt for recognition. Working with Saudi Arabia, Macron came up with a plan to have France plus G7 allies Britain and Canada recognize Palestinian statehood, while pushing Arab states to adopt a softer stance toward Israel through a UN conference. But despite weeks of talks he failed to get others on board. Three diplomats said London did not want to face the wrath of the US, and Ottawa took a similar stance, leaving Macron to go it alone. "It became increasingly apparent that we could not wait to get partners on board," said a French diplomat, adding France will work to get more states on board ahead of conference on a two-state solution in September. Domestically Macron was under rising pressure to do something amid widespread anger at the harrowing images coming out of Gaza. Although with both Europe's biggest Muslim and Jewish communities and a polarized political landscape, there was no obvious course of action that would satisfy all sides. Israel and its staunch supporter the US have blasted France's move, branding it a reward for the Palestinian militant group Hamas, which ran Gaza and whose attack on Israel on Oct. 7, 2023 triggered the current war. Macron had discussed the matter extensively with both Trump and Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu in advance. Trump said on Friday that France's decision didn't "carry any weight" but added Macron was "a good guy." French officials previously considered an announcement at a conference scheduled for June at the UN, co-hosted by France and Saudi Arabia, to sketch out a roadmap to a viable Palestinian state while also ensuring Israel's security. But the conference was postponed amid intense US diplomatic pressure and after Israeli airstrikes on Iran. Macron's announcement on Thursday is linked to a rescheduled and rejigged version of the UN conference, now planned to take place Monday and Tuesday. That meeting will be at ministerial level, but Paris decided it would hold a second event with heads of state and government on the sidelines of the UN General Assembly in September, where Macron will announce formal recognition. Some analysts say Macron has used the carrot of recognition to extract concessions from Mahmoud Abbas, the president of the Palestinian Authority which is a moderate rival to Hamas, and other regional players. "Macron here is acting as a catalyst to get the Palestinians to deliver on the needed reforms, to get the Arabs to deliver on a stabilization force and the disarming of Hamas," said Rym Momtaz, editor-in-chief of the Strategic Europe blog run by the Carnegie Europe think tank. Others say while recognition has symbolic value, there will still be no functioning Palestinian state whenever the war in Gaza comes to an end. "Recognition by a European heavyweight like France is indicative of the rising frustration with Israel's intransigent policies," said Amjad Iraqi, senior analyst at International Crisis Group. "What's the point of recognizing a state if they're doing little to stop it from turning into ruins?" French officials point to months of intense Israeli lobbying to try to prevent Macron's move -- and Netanyahu's fierce criticism of it -- as evidence that it matters a lot to Israeli leaders. Sources familiar with the matter say Israel's warnings to France had ranged from scaling back intelligence-sharing to complicating Paris' regional initiatives -- even hinting at possible annexation of parts of the West Bank. But French officials concluded that Netanyahu would do whatever he thought was in his interests in the West Bank anyway, regardless of what France did on recognition. Israel's parliament voted on Wednesday in favor of a non-binding declaration urging the government to apply Israeli law to the West Bank, widely seen as a de facto annexation of the territory. That added to the urgency in Paris. "If there is a moment in history to recognize a Palestinian state, even if it's just symbolic, then I would say that moment has probably come," said a senior French official.
