Damascus Believed It Had Green Light from US, ‘Israel' to Deploy Forces to Sweida: Report
Israel carried out strikes on Syrian troops and on Damascus on Wednesday in an escalation that took the leadership led by Ahmad Al-Saraa by surprise, the sources said, after government forces were accused of killing scores of people in the Druze city of Sweida.
Damascus believed it had a green light from both the US and 'Israel' to dispatch its forces south 'despite months of Israeli warnings not to do so,' according to the sources, which include Syrian political and military officials, two diplomats, and regional security sources.
That understanding was based on public and private comments from US special envoy for Syria Thomas Barrack, as well as on nascent security talks with 'Israel', the sources said, as quoted by Reuters. Barrack has called for Syria to be centrally administered as 'one country' without autonomous zones.
A State Department spokesperson declined to comment on private diplomatic discussions but said the United States supported the territorial unity of Syria.
'The Syrian state has an obligation to protect all Syrians, including minority groups,' the spokesperson said, according to Reuters, urging the Syrian government to hold perpetrators of violence accountable.
In response to Reuters questions, a senior official from Syria's ministry of foreign affairs denied that Barrack's comments had influenced the decision to deploy troops, which was made based on 'purely national considerations' and with the aim of 'stopping the bloodshed, protecting civilians and preventing the escalation of civil conflict'.
Damascus sent troops and tanks to Sweida province on Monday to quell fighting between allied Bedouin tribes and armed factions within the Druze community.
Syrian forces entering the city came under fire from Druze militia, according to Syrian sources.
Subsequent violence attributed to Syrian troops, including field executions and the humiliation of Druze civilians, amid Israeli strikes on Syrian security forces, the defense ministry in Damascus and the environs of the presidential palace, according to two sources, including a senior Gulf Arab official.
🎥 WATCH: when even mainstream media, that cheered for the ousting of pesident Assad, like Sky News' Alex Crawford reporting from Sweida exposes Julani's gangs looting homes, shops, even farm animals.
And this is what the West still dares to call a 'revolution'? These are no… pic.twitter.com/T9dQUAgF0i
— Marwa Osman || مروة عثمان (@Marwa__Osman) July 20, 2025
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