Sectarian clashes in Syria: Why are the Druze targeted?

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00:00For more on this story, we can bring in France 24's Wasim Nasser.

00:03Wasim, great to see you.

00:05Why are we seeing these sectarian clashes involving the Druze minority in Syria?

00:09Well, actually, almost a week ago, there was an audio, finally a fake audio attributed

00:15to a Druze sheikh insulting the Prophet, which ignited people to go into the street, manifestations,

00:21and on the other hand, Druze militants to attack checkpoints of the new Syrian authorities.

00:26As we speak, we have 47 Druze militants killed, 28 security members, 14 civilians, and 4 civilians

00:34due to drone strikes.

00:35Here's the map where the turmoil happened in the suburbs of Damascus, as you can see,

00:41and the yellow zone of Swaida.

00:44We have footage of troop transports going into Sahnaia, meaning when they pacified the area,

00:50security forces to stop the fighting, and here it is.

00:54And we also, we can see also the most important attacks happened in northern of Swaida, in

01:01the area called Asura al-Kubra.

01:04And we have pictures, actually, of a memorial of Issam Zahar al-Din, who was a former general

01:11of the Syrian army, loyal to Assad, who was burned by local militants, and even his house

01:17was burned.

01:18So it's a vengeance act.

01:21But what also happened is actually they went into a kind of a kind of mausoleum of Druze

01:29community.

01:30We have a video and which was burned, actually, by the locals.

01:33So it's a religious site for the Druze community who got burned.

01:37And here we see the upstick, you know, and like a sectarian turmoil that was like three

01:42days ago.

01:43So where are we now, almost a week after this violence around?

01:46Well, actually, we have two figures in the Druze community.

01:49We have Shaykh al-Hijri, we have his picture, maybe that we can see.

01:54He's against Shara, he's the man in the middle.

01:57And he is calling his man to resist to al-Shara as we speak.

02:01Another figure is al-Ba'lous, he's another Druze figure, actually, who's with Shara, helping

02:08Shara, and himself, his dad was killed by Assad, following a kind of fatwa by al-Hijri

02:13that we saw before.

02:15So inside the Druze community, there is turmoil regarding this issue.

02:19This picture is of him in 2022, so al-Ba'lous, fighting other Druze militant, which were

02:23at the time, who were at the time loyalist to Assad.

02:27And there is also a regional dimension, we're going to see the Druze Lebanese leader who went

02:31to Damascus on the 2nd of May, we have his picture to meet Shara, actually, and to support

02:38him, just to say that this turmoil isn't aimed only at Druze, that it's a problem that is

02:43not like a sectarian problem.

02:46They got an agreement with the help of Jumblat regarding the Sahnaia area that we saw before.

02:51It's the fourth agreement since the fall of Assad.

02:54We have pictures of Druze militants being liberated by the security forces.

02:58Here they are.

02:59So they are liberated and met by religious Druze figures.

03:03And we have also pictures of heavy armament that was handed to the new Syrian authorities.

03:08So we are talking about the heavy machine guns, Zou 23, that were handed.

03:12In this wider area, the agreement that was accomplished is that Druze militants would take back the

03:18area that we talked about.

03:20And we have a footage of this, the area of Surah Al-Qubra, where we saw the destroying

03:25of the Druze Muslim.

03:27And the fact is that Al-Hijri imposed on Shara that former Assad soldiers and militia and supporters

03:36integrate those forces.

03:38And his own forces, meaning actual security forces, left the area.

03:41So this is the state of the agreement as we speak now.

03:44But of course, among the supporters of Shara, people don't, some people don't actually like

03:49it.

03:50Because Sunni tribesmen in Swaida are fighting, are still fighting till yesterday, the Druze

03:56militiamen.

03:57And we have footage actually of a Sunni sheikh at the time when the Syrian government was declared.

04:02And here it is, he talked to Shara and he told him, like very vehemently, that Sunnis in

04:07Swaida are still marginalized.

04:09Meaning, under Assad they were marginalized and now they are marginalized.

04:12And actually it's his man today, or some of his men, that are fighting the Druze.

04:16Meaning the Sunnis in Swaida expect actually to take profit from the fall of Assad, which

04:21is not the case.

04:22And here when he talks to them, he tells them, you are not represented.

04:25And Shara tells him, you are represented with the minister.

04:27The minister of agriculture.

04:28But actually the minister of agriculture from Swaida is the Druze.

04:32So you see, the situation is complicated.

04:34The Sunnis there don't consider that they are represented by Druze.

04:37And Shara is trying actually to handle both sides.

04:41So given that Syrian authorities are trying to get a control of the situation by themselves,

04:47why is Israel getting involved?

04:48Well, actually Israel is in England, we have footage actually of the first drone strike.

04:53There was three strikes in the suburb of Damascus, helping Druze militants, as Israel says.

04:58They are actually answering the call of Druze in Israel, because Druze are really incorporated

05:04in the army in Israel and are very active in the Israeli society.

05:09And actually they asked the prime minister to act in Syria in support of Druze in Syria,

05:16actually.

05:17But on the other hand, we should know that more than 800 strikes, Israeli strikes happened

05:21in Syria since the fall of the regime, meaning artillery or by plane.

05:25And we have more than 200 incursions on Syrian soil.

05:29They enlarged the territory of activity of the Syrian, of the Israeli army since the fall

05:35of Assad.

05:36And up to now, Syria or the new government did not respond yet.

05:40There was two Jewish delegations, for example, coming from the States, Syrian Jewish delegations,

05:44who came into Syria after more than 50 years of being banned from going into Syria because

05:49the new government accepted it.

05:51The actual minister of foreign affairs, Syrian minister of foreign affairs, met Jewish representatives

05:57in New York.

05:58He even met the Rabbi Cooper and the Pastor Moore, who are coming to visit Syria soon.

06:03And here we see the Syrian president with the Azeri president, Aliyev, one of the most reliable

06:09allies of Israel in the region.

06:11And here we saw a delegation from Azerbaijan visiting the Syrian president in Damascus two days

06:16ago, meaning Syria is trying actually to find an agreement with Israel through Azerbaijan

06:22and through a pressure from American Jewish community, some of the American Jewish community,

06:27in order to calm things down and to stop the interventions of Israel in on Syrian soil.

06:32We'll see if that in fact does happen.

06:36Thank you very much for that.

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