Latest news with #majority-Druze
L'Orient-Le Jour
2 days ago
- Politics
- L'Orient-Le Jour
First humanitarian convoy enters Sweida
A first humanitarian aid convoy entered the majority-Druze city of Sweida in southern Syria on Sunday, following a week of deadly intercommunal fighting, a Syrian Red Crescent official told AFP. A fragile cease-fire took effect Sunday in the province of Sweida, where clashes have left over 1,000 dead, according to the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights (SOHR). An AFP correspondent near the city saw the convoy, made up of white vehicles bearing the Red Crescent emblem. 'This is the first convoy to enter since the latest events, and it is now inside the city of Sweida,' Omar al-Maliki, spokesperson for the Syrian Red Crescent, told AFP. He added that the convoy's entry, the first of several, was 'coordinated between government parties and local authorities in Sweida,' which is controlled by Druze factions. The 32-vehicle convoy carried food, medical supplies, fuel and body bags. Residents say the besieged city is without water and electricity. A second aid convoy, organized by Syrian authorities and including over 40 trucks along with three government ministers, was unable to enter the city, according to Damascus. The Syrian Foreign Ministry claimed that 'armed militias affiliated with Sheikh Hikmat al-Hijri blocked the entry of the convoy.' Sheikh al-Hijri, one of the Druze community's most influential religious figures, has drawn government ire for calling for international protection of the Druze and appealing for help from Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu. Israel, home to a Druze minority, has said it intends to protect the community in Syria. In a statement Sunday, Sheikh al-Hijri said that 'all aid reaching the devastated province of Sweida through international organizations and parties is welcome.' The violence, which erupted on July 13 between Druze fighters and Bedouin tribes before escalating with the intervention of government forces and tribal groups from across Syria, has killed more than 1,000 people, according to SOHR. The morgue of Sweida's government hospital is full, and bodies were seen lying outside the facility, an AFP photographer reported Sunday. Un premier convoi humanitaire entre à Soueida
Al-Ahram Weekly
4 days ago
- Politics
- Al-Ahram Weekly
Erdogan warns of regional fallout from Syria clashes as Putin urges calm - Region
Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan on Friday warned that escalating violence in Syria's Druze heartland threatens to engulf the region, accusing Israel of fuelling the unrest, while Russian President Vladimir Putin voiced 'deep concern' and called for urgent de-escalation through dialogue. In a phone call between the two leaders, Erdogan said the fighting in Sweida 'posed a threat to the entire region' and demanded that Israel end its interference in Syria. Putin, according to the Kremlin's readout, underscored the 'importance of rapidly stabilising the situation through dialogue,' while expressing alarm at the scale of the violence. Sweida, a majority-Druze province in southern Syria, has been the site of heavy clashes since Sunday, as Druze fighters battled Sunni Bedouin tribes, the army, and its allies, leaving hundreds dead. On Thursday, Erdogan warned Israel was exploiting the Druze minority as cover for 'expanding its banditry into neighbouring Syria,' calling its actions 'the biggest problem in our region.' Israel has said it will continue its attacks on Syrian military positions and infrastructure until Syria's government withdraws from Sweida. *This story was edited by Ahram Online. Follow us on: Facebook Instagram Whatsapp Short link:
LeMonde
4 days ago
- Health
- LeMonde
In Syria, a cycle of revenge engulfs the Druze city of Sweida
Bodies were piled on the floors of rooms inside the National Hospital of Sweida, in the center of this majority-Druze city in southern Syria. Others were lined up in blood-soaked corridors. Kamal, a Druze doctor at the hospital, confirmed to Le Monde the authenticity of scenes shown in two videos filmed on Wednesday, July 16. For security reasons, the names of all witnesses quoted, including Kamal, have been changed. The city, surrounded, is cut off and inaccessible. Caught in the fighting from Tuesday to Thursday that pitted government forces, backed by tribal fighters, against Druze factions, the medical team had to operate without electricity, without water and with only the remaining medical supplies. "Most of the bodies are those of civilians. We had nowhere left to put them. Since then, the number has increased even more. There are at least 200, maybe 300, including at least 21 women and 45 children," Kamal said by phone on Thursday evening. The victims were killed by artillery fire, sniper fire and, in some cases, summary executions. The doctor accused government forces, who took control of the neighborhood on Wednesday, of attacking the hospital before withdrawing from Sweida at midnight. "They placed two tanks in front of the hospital and started shelling us until an RPG round destroyed one of the tanks," the doctor said. "Anyone who tried to bring the wounded to the hospital was targeted by the tanks and snipers. The soldiers told us: 'If you leave the room, you'll be shot. If you hide anyone, you'll be executed.' They asked us if we were Druze or Muslim," Kamal continued. He said that a young man helping the medical staff was shot dead because he stood up to the soldiers. Two doctors, Faten Hilal and Talaat Fawzi Amer, were killed by snipers near the hospital.
NDTV
5 days ago
- Politics
- NDTV
Syrians Find Bodies In Streets While Searching For Loved Ones Amid Clashes
Jaramana: A Syrian Druze woman living in the United Arab Emirates frantically tried to keep in touch with her family in her hometown in southern Syria as clashes raged there over the past days. Her mother, father and sister sent videos of their neighbors fleeing as fighters moved in. The explosions from shelling were non-stop, hitting near their house. Her family took shelter in the basement. When she reached them later in a video call, they said her father was missing. He had gone out during a lull to check the situation and never returned. 'Now I only pray. That's all I can do," she told The Associated Press at the time. Hours later, they learned he had been shot and killed by a sniper. The woman spoke on condition of anonymity fearing that using her name would put her surviving family and friends at risk. A ceasefire went into effect late Wednesday, easing days of brutal clashes in Sweida. Now, members of its Druze community who fled or went into hiding are returning to search for loved ones and count their losses. They are finding homes looted and bloodied bodies of civilians in the streets. The fighting began with tit-for-tat kidnappings and attacks between local Sunni Bedouin tribes and Druze militias in the majority-Druze Sweida province. Government forces that intervened to restore order clashed with the Druze militias, but also in some cases attacked civilians. At least 600 people — combatants and civilians on both sides — were killed in four days of clashes, according to the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights, a Britain-based war monitor. It said the dead included more than 80 civilians, mostly Druze, who were rounded up by fighters and collectively shot to death in what the monitor called 'field executions.' 'These are not individual acts but systemic,' the Observatory's director Rami Abdul-Rahman told the AP. 'All the violations are there. You can see from the bodies that are all over the streets in Sweida clearly show they're shot in the head.' In response, Druze militias have targeted Bedouin families in revenge attacks since the ceasefire was reached. Footage shared on Syrian state media shows Bedouin families putting their belongings in trucks and fleeing with reports of renewed skirmishes in those areas. There was no word on casualties in those attacks. Most of the Syrian Druze who spoke to the AP requested anonymity, fearing they and their families could be targeted. The Druze religious sect is an offshoot of Ismailism, a branch of Shiite Islam. More than half of the roughly 1 million Druze worldwide live in Syria. The others live in Lebanon and Israel, including in the Golan Heights, which Israel captured from Syria in the 1967 Mideast War and annexed in 1981. They largely celebrated the downfall in December of Syrian autocrat Bashar Assad but were divided over interim President Ahmad al-Sharaa's Sunni Islamist rule. The latest violence has left the community more skeptical of Syria's new leadership and doubtful of peaceful coexistence. One Syrian-American Druze told the AP of his fear as he watched the clashes from the United States and tried to account for his family and friends whom he had seen in a recent trip to his native city, Sweida. Despite internet and communications breakdowns, he tracked down his family. His mother and brother fled because their home was shelled and raided, he said. Their belongings were stolen, and windows shattered. Their neighbors' house was burned down. Two other neighbors were killed, one by shelling, another by stray bullets, he said. He also pored over online videos of the fighting, finding harrowing footage. It showed gunmen in military uniform forcing a number of men in civilian clothes to kneel in the street in a well-known roundabout in Sweida. The gunmen then spray the men with automatic fire, their bodies dropping to the ground. The footage was seen by the AP. To his horror, he recognized the men. One was a close family friend — another Syrian American on a visit to Sweida from the US The others were the friend's brother, father, three uncles, and a cousin. Friends he reached told him that government forces had raided the house where they were all staying and took them outside and shot them. 'We affirm that protecting your rights and freedoms is among our top priorities,' al-Sharaa said in a speech broadcast Thursday, where he addressed the Druze people in Syria, promising to hold perpetrators of civilian killings to account. But some rights groups accused Syria's interim government of systematic sectarian violence, similar to that inflicted on the Alawite religious minority in the coastal province of Latakia in the aftermath of Assad's fall as the new government tried to quell a counterinsurgency there. Footage widely circulated on social media showed some of the carnage. One video shows a living room with several bodies on the floor and bullet holes in the walls and sofa. In another, there are at least nine bloodied bodies in one room of the home of a family that took in people fleeing the fighting. Portraits of Druze notables are visible, smashed on the floor. Evelyn Azzam, a Druze woman, is searching the Damascus suburb of Jaramana, trying to find out what happened to her husband, Robert Kiwan. Last week, the 23-year-old Kiwan left home in Jaramana early as he does every day to commute to his job in Sweida. He got caught up in the chaos when the clashes erupted. Azzam was on the phone with him as government forces questioned him and his coworkers. She heard a gunshot when one of the coworkers raised his voice. She heard her husband trying to appeal to the soldiers. 'He was telling them that they are from the Druze of Sweida, but have nothing to do with the armed groups,' the 20-year-old Azzam said. Then she heard another gunshot; her husband was shot in the hip. An ambulance took him to a hospital, where she later learned he underwent an operation. But she hasn't heard anything since and doesn't know if he survived. Back in the US, the Syrian-American said he was relieved that his family is safe but the video of his friend's family being gunned down in the street filled him with 'disbelief, betrayal, rage.' He said his family and friends protested against Assad, celebrated his downfall and wanted to give al-Sharaa's rule a chance. He said he hadn't wanted to believe that the new Syrian army — which emerged from al-Sharaa's insurgent forces — was made up of Islamic militants. But after the violence in Latakia and now in Sweida, he sees the new army as a 'bunch of militias … with a huge majority being radicals.' 'I can't imagine a world where I would be able to go back and integrate with these monsters,' he said.
L'Orient-Le Jour
5 days ago
- Politics
- L'Orient-Le Jour
Violence in Sweida: Joint statement from foreign ministers of several Arab countries and Turkey
The foreign ministers of several Arab countries, including Jordan, the United Arab Emirates, Bahrain, Saudi Arabia, Iraq, Oman, Qatar, Kuwait, Lebanon and Egypt, along with Turkey's foreign minister, held intensive discussions on the situation in Syria. At the end of the meetings, they reaffirmed their standard position and joint efforts to support the Syrian government in rebuilding the country, guaranteeing its security, stability, unity, sovereignty and the rights of all its citizens, according to a statement relayed by the office of the Lebanese Foreign Ministry. The release also relayed a joint statement to, "1) Support Syria's security, unity, stability and sovereignty, rejecting any foreign interference, 2) Welcome the agreement putting an end to the crisis in the province of Sweida, insisting on its implementation to protect Syria and its inhabitants, 3) Endorse the Syrian President's commitment to prosecute those responsible for the violations in Sweida, and to strengthen security and the rule of law throughout Syria, while rejecting violence, sectarianism and incitement to hatred, 4) Strongly condemn the repeated Israeli attacks on Syria, calling them flagrant violations of international law that threaten Syrian stability and sovereignty, and jeopardize reconstruction efforts, 5) Affirm that Syria's security and stability are fundamental to regional security, 6) Call on the international community to support Syrian reconstruction, urge the Security Council to uphold its responsibilities to ensure Israel's complete withdrawal from occupied Syrian territories, the cessation of Israeli hostilities, compliance with the 1974 disengagement agreement, and implementation of resolution 2766." The majority-Druze city of Sweida in southern Syria suffered heavy casualties Thursday, following the withdrawal of government troops. Interim president Ahmad al-Sharaa ordered this withdrawal in an effort, he said, to avoid an 'open war' with Israel, which had threatened to intensify its strikes if the Syrian authorities did not leave the province, where clashes have left more than 500 dead since Sunday.
