AFPMortal clashes between the Islamist armed factions, the security forces and the Druze religious minority fighters near Damascus are another sign of the continuous fragility of the security situation in Syria after the reversal of Bashar al-Assad.
External players were again involved, Israel saying that he had made air strikes to protect Druze civilians.
It marks another fault line in Syria, which was fractured and divided following 13 years of devastating civil war and decades of authoritarian domination by the Assad dynasty.
The new Syrian authorities said they were determined to bring unity and stability, but many inside and outside the country always indicate their roots in jihadism and remain suspicious of their program.
Before President Assad was overthrown, his reign had been restored in the main cities of Syria and along the highways between them – as well as the coastal heart of the Alawite sect to which his family belongs.
But there were other regions partially or almost completely out of control.
They included Idlib in the North, hence the current chief of Syria, Ahmed Al-Sharaa, directed his Islamist rebel faction Hayat Tahrir Al-Sham (HTS)-a former affiliate of Al-Qaeda-to victory last December.
In the northeast, the Syrian Kurdish forces maintained a semi-autonomy throughout the civil war and beyond.
And south of Damascus, the Druze also had limited autonomy.
These divisions remain, although the Allawites areas are now the most serious lightning points for the new leaders of Syria.
In March, the days of fighting between the security forces and the combatants are still faithful to Assad left hundreds of deaths, including civilians. Other armed factions vaguely affiliated with the new authorities have also been involved and carried out murders of revenge against local Alawites.
Such violence is the greatest fear both for those who support Sharaa and those who are against him.
AFPThe last clashes south of Damascus again involved fighters from several of the armed factions still active in Syria and the Druze. Their religion is a branching of Islam, with important communities not only in Syria, but also in Lebanon, Jordan and Israel.
It was the link with Israel that prompted the country’s air force to make several strikes during fights in and around the city of Ashrafiyat Sahnaya on Wednesday.
The Israeli government said the operation was a warning and demanded that the Syrian authorities prevent damage to the Druze.
Syrian authorities said the security forces had been deployed to Ashrafiyat Sahnaya to restore security and stability, accusing what she called “outlaws outlaws” based there to encourage clashes.
But the spiritual leader of the Druze community of Syria, Sheikh Hikmat al-Hijri, condemned violence as an “unjustifiable genocidal campaign” and said that people had defended their homes against attacks of extremists.
According to the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights, at least 101 people were killed this week in Ashrafiyat Sahnaya, the mainly suburbs of Druze of Jaramana, and the southern Province of Suweida, which has a majority in Druze.
The United Kingdom-based surveillance group said that 71 members of the Druze community, including 10 civilians and 35 armed men who were slaughtered in an “ambush” while traveling from Suwaida to Damascus on Wednesday, as well as 30 members of the Allied security forces and armed groups.
ReutersFor the moment, at least, the violence has decreased, the government would have agreed to ceases with the local leaders of Druze.
But the suddenness and the ferocity with which the clashes broke out – invited him to an audio recording circulating on the social networks of a man insulting the prophet Muhammad, wrongly attributed to a religious of Druze – shows the potential that Syria is with conflict.
There are mutual suspicions between the new authorities led by Islamists and religious minorities such as the Alawites and the Druze.
It is a fuel mixture, which is still ignited only by the role that external countries like Israel and Turkey continue to play. The two have advanced their interests in Syria since the fall of Assad.
Israel has seized more land in southern Syria beyond the Golan Heights region which it has occupied for a long time.
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu called for the complete demilitarization of Suweida and two other provinces south of Damascus. He says that the new Syrian government is extremist and that the presence of its security forces anywhere near the border would represent a threat to Israel.
Israel has played its link with the Druze community in the region, presenting themselves as their defender, even if many Syrians Druze themselves do not see it in this way.
The new Damascus authorities have rejected Israel’s measures as a violation of Syria’s sovereignty, although they clearly wanted to understand that they are not looking in conflict with Israel.
EPATurkey was the main sponsor of the rebel forces which finally ousted Assad and he established close ties with the new management of the country. Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan denounced Israel’s last military intervention in Syria as a “dangerous and unacceptable provocation”.
The tensions between Turkey and Israel for their various objectives in the New Syria add another complication to the multitude of problems faced by Sharaa and its government.
With so many forces inside and outside Syria still dangerously disagreement, the objective of unification and stabilization of the country – despite certain successes so far – remains extremely difficult.
Syria will need a lot of respiratory space as well as the financial and political support of the international community to make real progress towards a better future for its citizens, impoverished and uprooted by years of bitter conflict.
