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Nahar Net
06-08-2025
- Politics
- Nahar Net
Syria violence triggers fears among Lebanese Druze
by Naharnet Newsdesk 06 August 2025, 17:21 Mireille Rebeiz, Dickinson College and Said Abou Zaki, Lebanese American University Violence continues several weeks after clashes started between armed Bedouin clans, Sunni jihadist groups and Druze fighters on July 14, 2025, in Sweida, a city in southern Syria. Hundreds of Druze were killed in the clashes, and Syria's defense minister deployed forces to contain the sectarian fighting. The Druze are a religious minority in the Levant, the region covering roughly modern-day Syria, Lebanon, Jordan, Israel and Palestinian territories. The faith originated in Egypt as an offshoot of the Fatimid tradition, a branch of Shiite Islam. Today, there are about 1 million to 1.5 million Druze worldwide, more than half of whom live in Syria. Most others live in Lebanon, Israel, Jordan and the Israeli-occupied Golan Heights. We are experts in Druze and Lebanese history, and we know that the conflict in Sweida is regarded by the Druze of Lebanon – and the Druze everywhere – as a deeply personal matter. What's more, the horror stories coming out of Sweida are reverberating in Lebanon, where many Druze also fear the risk of sectarian violence, and distrust in current leadership. Bonds forged through a long history Many scholars attribute the strong bond between the Druze of Syria and Lebanon to their shared faith – which is partly true – but they often overlook an equally vital element: a collective conscience shaped by a distinctive origin story. The Druze see themselves as an ancient, blood-related tribal coalition that evolved into an extended family spread across regions. This self-perception is so deeply rooted that it gave rise to a well-known Levantine saying: "The Druze are like a copper plate – wherever you strike it, it rings." According to local tradition, several Druze families from Mount Lebanon migrated to the Hawran region, south of Damascus, more than three centuries ago, paving the way for thousands of others to follow. Sweida is the capital city of the Druze region in Ḥawran. The region of Ḥawran is the second-youngest Druze settlement – after Jordan – dating back to the 18th century. A foundational event in the community's modern history was the Druze uprising in Ḥawran against the Ottoman governor of Egypt, Muhammad Ali Pasha, in 1837. The governor had insisted on imposing conscription and disarmament on the Druze. The community rebelled since both measures would put their security and autonomy at risk, and the governor sent the army to occupy the Levant. During the revolt, Druze from Mount Lebanon and Wadi al-Taym – a historical Druze region encompassing the modern-day Lebanese districts of Rashayya and Hasbayya in the southeast, near the Syrian border – rose up to divert the Egyptian army and sent fighters to support their Syrian kin. In 1838, many of these Lebanese fighters were killed, particularly in what is known as the Battle of Wadi Bakka, near the Lebanese-Syrian border; an entire Druze battalion was besieged by the Egyptian forces and nearly wiped out. In 1860, a third civil war involving the Druze under the Ottomans broke out in Mount Lebanon between the Druze and the Maronites. The Maronites are a group of Eastern Catholic Christians predominantly in Lebanon. The conflict centered on control of the southern regions of the mountain – historically known as the Druze Country. As violence escalated between the two communities, the Druze of Ḥawran came to the aid of their fellow Druze in Mount Lebanon, tipping the balance in their favor. During World War I, Mount Lebanon was hit by a famine and around 200,000 people died. The Druze of Ḥawran supported the Druze in Lebanon by supplying them with essential grain, and many Lebanese Druze resettled in Ḥawran to escape starvation. These are just a few examples from a long history of mutual support that, in the Druze collective memory, reinforces the belief that they are not merely a community – but a tightly knit extended family that spans national borders. Shifting borders As a religious minority in the Levant, the Druze have long defended their religious freedom and identity. The principalities in Mount Lebanon were most successful at realizing and keeping religious autonomy from at least the 12th century to the 19th century; they ensured the Druze were ruled by one of their own emirs and could practice their religious and social customs freely. The modern state of Lebanon evolved out of these autonomous principalities. However, the Druze never viewed their struggle for social and religious autonomy as a license to attack their neighbors – especially fellow Arab Muslims – but rather as a safeguard for their faith and security. The Druze do not equate religious freedom and autonomy with independence. In fact, many Druze in the region oppose the idea of a Druze state. Starting in the 1930s, Zionist leaders hoping to create a Jewish state sought to exploit this Druze desire toward autonomy by proposing the creation of a Druze state in Ḥawran. They envisioned it as a friendly buffer state bordering the future state of Israel. More importantly, they wanted to push Druze out of Galilee and Mount Carmel knowing that they lived there for many centuries. After the Six-Day War in 1967 between Israel and Egypt, Jordan and Syria, this idea expanded into a broader Israeli plan to fragment Syria and Lebanon into five sectarian states: an Alawite state in the north, a Christian state in the west, a Druze state in the south, a Kurdish state in the east and a Sunni state at the center. Since Oct. 7, 2023, some Druze leaders – such as Walid Jumblat, former minister, and head of the Progressive Socialist Party – have raised concerns that Israel could be attempting to revive this plan to reshape the region into a "New Middle East" with potentially new borders in Syria, Iraq, Lebanon, and the Palestinian territories. In fact, since the fall of the Assad regime in Syria, Jumblat has been vocal about the rise of potential new borders. Historically, the highest Druze religious authorities rarely engage in day-to-day politics. Yet, they are still expected to offer moral and political guidance during times of crisis, as the community sees them as guardians of faith, identity and ethics. Recently, the leading Druze spiritual authority in Lebanon, Sheikh Amin al-Sayegh – who has been at odds with Jumblat on internal communal affairs – voiced similar concerns in a public letter of condolence and support to the Syrian Druze. He emphasized the community's Arab Islamic identity and warned against prioritizing material security over the historical Druze identity. Al-Sayegh's stance reflects long-standing Druze political principles rooted in centuries of tradition. The political message was clearly hinting at a rising tendency among some Druze, including Syrians, to consider stronger ties with Israel for security purposes. Growing fear of sectarian violence Lebanon has a long history of sectarian violence, and the recent events in Syria are indeed alarming to Lebanon's religious minorities, including the Druze. In March 2025, over 1,400 Alawite civilians were massacred, mostly in coastal cities like Latakia and Baniyas, by the newly formed Syrian forces. In June, 25 Syrian civilians were killed and over 60 injured when a Sunni extremist group attacked the Greek Orthodox Church of the Prophet Elias in Damascus. And as of mid-July, Bedouin clans and the state security forces of the Sharaa regime have been targeting and killing Druze civilians in Sweida. With numerous Bedouin tribes present in Lebanon, and tension evolving into an open sectarian confrontation, Druze leaders there fear that the sectarian violence could spill over into their own communities due to the Syrian Bedouins' call for general mobilization of Arab tribes in the region against the Druze. This call is based on unverified reports of Druze killing Bedouin civilians. Druze leadership in Lebanon Despite growing frustration over Lebanon's deepening economic crisis – partly attributed to political leadership – most Lebanese Druze remained loyal to traditional figures like Jumblat, who was long viewed as the most capable guardian of their security and communal interests. But the shock of recent violence in Sweida, where militias aligned with the Syrian regime targeted Druze civilians, has unsettled that loyalty. Many Lebanese Druze had expected their leaders to use their external influence to shield their kin across the border. The perceived failure to do so – combined with Jumblat's continued support for the regime led by President Ahmad al-Sharaa in Syria – has sparked widespread criticism within the community. Jumblat himself acknowledged this strong criticism in a recent interview. For many Druze, the brutal events in Sweida were fiercely traumatic and have forced them to painfully confront their long-standing core political priorities: security and the preservation of religious and social autonomy. And in light of this, some are beginning to reassess long-held assumptions that current leadership can preserve their religious autonomy and, more importantly, keep them safe. The Conversation is an independent and nonprofit source of news, analysis and commentary from academic experts. The Conversation is wholly responsible for the content.
Nahar Net
10-07-2025
- Politics
- Nahar Net
Can Lebanon chart path away from region conflicts after Hezbollah weakening?
Mireille Rebeiz, Dickinson College After a 12-day war launched by Israel and joined briefly by the United States, Iran has emerged weakened and vulnerable. And that has massive implications for another country in the region: Lebanon. Hezbollah, Tehran's main ally in Lebanon, had already lost a lot of its fighters, arsenal and popular support during its own war with Israel in October 2024. Now, Iran's government has little capacity to continue to finance, support and direct Hezbollah in Lebanon like it has done in the past. Compounding this shift away from Hezbollah's influence, the U.S. recently laid down terms for a deal that would see the withdrawal of Israeli troops from southern Lebanon in return for the total disarmament of the paramilitary group – a proposal seemingly backed by the Lebanese government. As an expert on Lebanese history and culture, I believe that these changing regional dynamics give the Lebanese state an opening to chart a more neutral orientation and extricate itself from neighboring conflicts that have long exacerbated the divided and fragile country's chronic problems. The shaping of modern Lebanon Ideologically, developments in Iran played a major role in shaping the circumstances in which Hezbollah, the Shiite Islamist political party and paramilitary group, was born. The Iranian Revolution of 1978-79 toppled the widely reviled and corrupt Western-backed monarchy of Shah Mohammad Reza and led to the establishment of an Islamic republic. That revolution resonated among the young Shiite population in Lebanon, where a politically sectarian system that was intended to reflect a balanced representation of Muslims and Christians in the country had led to de facto discrimination against underrepresented groups. Since Lebanon's independence from France in 1943, most of the power has been concentrated in the hands of the Maronite Christians and Sunnis, leaving Shiite regions in south Lebanon and the Bekaa Valley lacking in development projects, social services and infrastructure. At the same time, Lebanon for decades had been irreparably changed by the politics of its powerful neighbor in Israel. In the course of founding its state in 1948, Israel forcibly removed over 750,000 Palestinians from their homeland – what Palestinians refer to as the Nakba, or "catastophe." Many fled to Lebanon, largely in the country's impoverished south and Bekaa Valley, which became a center of Palestinian resistance to Israel. In 1978, Israel invaded Lebanon to push Palestinian fighters away from its northern borders and put an end to rockets launched from south Lebanon. This fighting included the massacre of many civilians and the displacement of many Lebanese and Palestinians farther north. In 1982, Israel invaded Lebanon again with the stated purpose of eliminating the Palestinian Liberation Organization that had moved its headquarters to the country's south. An estimated 17,000 to 19,000 Lebanese and Palestinian civilians and armed personnel were killed during the conflict and the accompanying siege of Beirut. It was in this cauldron of regional and domestic sectarianism and state abandonment that Hezbollah formed as a paramilitary group in 1985, buoyed by Shiite mobilization following the Iranian revolution and Israel's invasion and occupation. Hezbollah's domestic spoiler status Over time and with the continuous support of Iran, Hezbollah become an important player in the Middle East, intervening in the Syrian civil war to support the Assad regime and supporting the Kata'ib Hezbollah, a dominant Iraqi pro-Iranian militia. In 2016, Secretary General of Hezbollah Sayyed Hassan Nasrallah officially recognized Iran's role in funding their activities. With Tehran's support, Hezbollah was effectively able to operate as a state within a state while using its political clout to veto the vast majority of Lebanese parliamentary decisions it opposed. Amid that backdrop, Lebanon endured three long presidential vacuums: from November 2007 to May 2008; from May 2014 to October 2016; and finally from October 2022 to January 2024. Lebanon also witnessed a series of political assassinations from 2005 to 2021 that targeted politicians, academics, journalists and other figures who criticized Hezbollah. How the equation has changed It would be an understatement, then, to say that Hezbollah's and Iran's weakened positions as a result of their respective conflicts with Israel since late 2023 create major political ramifications for Lebanon. The most recent vacuum at the presidential level ended amid Hezbollah's military losses against Israel, with Lebanon electing the former army commander Joseph Aoun as president. Meanwhile, despite the threat of violence, the Lebanese opposition to Hezbollah, which consists of members of parliament and public figures, has increased its criticism of Hezbollah, openly denouncing its leadership and calling for Lebanon's political neutrality. These dissenting voices emerged cautiously during the Syrian civil war in 2011 and have grown after the Oct. 7 Hamas attacks and the subsequent war on Gaza. During the latest Israel-Iran war, the Lebanese opposition felt emboldened to reiterate its call for neutrality. Enabled by the U.S's growing tutelage over Lebanon, some opposition figures have even called to normalize relations with Israel. These efforts to keep Lebanon out of the circle of violence are not negligible. In the past, they would have been attacked by Hezbollah and its supporters for what they would have considered high treason. Today, they represent new movement for how leaders are conceiving of politics domestically and diplomacy across the region. The critical regional context going forward As the political system cautiously changes, Hezbollah is facing unprecedented financial challenges and is unable to meet its fighters' needs and the promise to rebuild war-destroyed homes. And with its own serious internal challenges, Iran now has much less ability to meaningfully support Hezbollah from abroad. But none of that means that Hezbollah is defeated as a political and military force, particularly as ongoing skirmishes with Israel give the group an external pretext. The Hezbollah-Israel war ended with a ceasefire brokered by the United States and France on Nov. 27, 2024. However, Israel has been attacking south Lebanon on an almost daily basis, including three incidents over the course of 10 days from late June to early July that have left several people dead and more than a dozen wounded. Amid these violations, Hezbollah continues to refuse to disarm and still casts itself as the only defender of Lebanon's territorial integrity, again undermining the power of the Lebanese army and state. Lebanon's other neighbor, Syria, will also be critical. The fall of the Assad regime in December 2024 diminished Hezbollah's powers in the region and land access to Iraq and Iran. And the new Syrian leadership is not interested in supporting the Iranian Shiite ideology in the region but rather in empowering the Sunni community, one that was oppressed under the Assad dictatorship. While it's too early to say, border tensions might translate into sectarian violence in Lebanon or even potential land loss. Yet the new Syrian government also has a different approach toward its neighbors than its predecessor. After decades of hostility, Syria seems to be opting for diplomacy with Israel rather than war. It is unclear what these negotiations will entail and how they will impact Lebanon and Hezbollah. However, there are real concerns about new borders in the region. The U.S. as ever will play a major role in next steps in Lebanon and the region. The U.S. has been pressing Lebanon to disarm Hezbollah, and the U.S Ambassador to Turkey and special envoy for Syria Thomas Barrack said he was "unbelievably satisfied" by Lebanon's response thus far. But so far, there has been no fundamental shift on that front. Meanwhile, despite the calls for neutrality and the U.S. pressure on Lebanon, it is hard to envision a new and neutral Lebanon without some serious changes in the region. Any future course for Lebanon will still first require progress toward peace in Gaza and ensuring Iran commits not to use Hezbollah as a proxy in the future. This article is republished from The Conversation under a Creative Commons license. Read the original article here:
