At least 30 people were killed over the weekend in clashes between Druze militia and Sunni Muslim Bedouin tribes in the southern Syrian province of Sweida.
The Syrian Interior Ministry reported over 100 injuries in addition to the deaths.
The London-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights (SOHR) cited its sources inside Syria to provide a much worse casualty estimate of 89 dead, including 14 members of the Syrian government’s security force.
The fighting reportedly began on Friday when armed Bedouins seized a young Druze vegetable vendor on the highway between Sweida and the capital city of Damascus. The area where the kidnapping occurred is a predominantly Bedouin neighborhood in the majority-Druze city of Sweida.
The Druze are one of Syria’s numerous ethnic and religious minorites. About half of the world’s one million Druze live in Syria, while most of the rest live in Lebanon and Israel.
The Druze feared persecution after the fall of Syrian dictator Bashar Assad in December, so Israel offered them protection, striking extremist groups allegedly preparing to attack Syrian Druze communities and warning Syria’s junta government to keep its troops away from Druze neighborhoods in the Golan Heights.
Roughly a million Bedouins live in Syria, organized into nomadic clans. Like the bulk of the Syrian population, they are Sunni Muslims, whereas the Assad dynasty was ruled by members of a Shiite sect called the Alawites. The Bedouin lifestyle of herding camels, sheep, and goats across the steppes of Syria was severely impacted by the long and brutal Syrian civil war.
Druze militia retaliated for the merchant’s abduction over the weekend and the violence quickly escalated and spread across the province. Local media reported that bands of Bedouin tribesmen attacked villages outside the city of Sweida. Several of the fatalities were said to be women and children.
The government of interim president Ahmed al-Sharaa said on Sunday it was deploying internal security forces and Syrian Arab Army units to “end the clashes quickly and decisively.”
“The lack of state, military and security institutions is a major reason for the ongoing tensions in Sweida. The only solution is to reactivate these institutions to ensure civil peace,” argued Interior Minister Anas Khabbab.
“Some clashes occurred with outlawed armed groups, but our forces are doing their best to prevent any civilian casualties,” a spokesman for the Interior Ministry on Monday said.
Some Druze leaders told a different story, accusing government security forces of aiding the Bedouins.
Shiekh Hikmat al-Hijri, a Druze spiritual leader, requested “international protection” on Monday because government security forces were allegedly “supporting takfiri gangs with their heavy weapons and drones.” Takfiri, a term for apostates or false Muslims, is often used to denounce terrorists or radicals.
Other Druze leaders held the government in Damascus “primarily responsible for the current situation, due to its failure to maintain security, its silence in the face of repeated violations and its tolerance of affiliated factions interfering and siding with one group over another.”
Unverified videos circulating on social media showed what appeared to be Druze men beating several captured members of the Syrian government security force.
The central government reached an agreement with the Druze in May, after earlier Druze-Bedouin clashes, to secure the highway between Sweida and Damascus without putting external security forces inside Sweida province. Those earlier clashes, which killed dozens of people, were allegedly caused by an audio recording of a Druze man “insulting” Islam’s prophet Muhammad.
Druze and Bedouin leaders held informal talks to reduce tensions on Sunday night, leading to the release of prisoners taken by both sides, but fighting surged again on Monday after a series of drone attacks against Druze villages was reported.
The Israel Defense Forces (IDF) said on Monday that it “struck several tanks in the area between as-Sijn and Sama al-Kharab in southern Syria” as the tanks were advancing toward Sweida. It was the first direct confrontation between Israeli and Syrian forces since May.
“This cycle of violence has exploded in a terrifying way, and if it doesn’t end, we are heading toward a bloodbath,” Sweida-based Druze researcher Rayan Marouf warned on Monday.
Marouf’s website, Sweida24, reported that at least six Syrian troops were killed in the province on Monday.
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