The al-Qasim family was sitting at home in fear when fighting started near the Arab Bank in Sahnaya, a town located on the outskirts of Damascus that is home to a sizable Druze community. The family members felt paralyzed by the sounds of violence after hours of brutal clashes right on their doorstep. The scenario was all too familiar; only the month before, over 1,500 people were killed in sectarian massacres in the coastal areas of Syria, including 102 children and 99 women, according to the Syrian Network for Human Rights.
The family, whose real names, like those of other interviewees for this article, have been withheld because of security concerns, believed it was just a matter of time before they would suffer a similar fate. Only a few yards from their home, the attackers were chanting slurs against the Druze community, accompanied by shots fired into the air from Kalashnikov-style assault rifles.
“Sunni, Sunni, no, no, Druze. There is no other God than Allah,” could be heard on the streets coming from armed men wearing insignias showing the new Syrian flag. These were scenes reminiscent of the most brutal periods of Syria’s 14-year civil war.
Suddenly, a group of men in military fatigues forced their way into the house. They separated the women and children from the men, confining each group to different rooms. One of the intruders entered the room where the women and children were, carrying a large machete, his hands covered in blood.
Meanwhile, in the other room, another man began assaulting the male family members. The men were ordered to lie face down and were warned that any movement or noise would result in their deaths. “They severely beat my brother, claiming there was a weapon in the house. They broke his nose, caused his eye to swell, and opened a wound on his forehead,” Myriam, one of the women who was present, told New Lines.
Five-year-old Ibrahim and his 10-year-old sister Maria were terrified as one of the attackers brandished the machete in their faces, shouting threats and ordering them to stay silent or be killed. At the same time, the remaining attackers stole everything of value they could carry from the house, including money, phones and gold. After the assailants left, the neighbors entered the home to check if the family had survived. They found the al-Qasim family in a state of deep shock.
“When the gunmen left and we were able to escape to a safe place, we noticed that the children were having difficulty sleeping and were having recurring nightmares,” their mother said. “My son had even lost his ability to speak fluently, began to stutter and began to react with panic to the smallest situations.”
Since that day — April 29 — little Ibrahim has had speech problems, barely speaking a few words a day.
The fighting had begun on April 28 in Jaramana, another town with a large Druze population located on the outskirts of Damascus, after armed men approached the entry checkpoint at 2 a.m. The scene was confusing, with some eyewitnesses claiming that the men were dressed in clothing worn by General Security forces, which fall under the Ministry of Defence, while others say they came from Mleiha, a nearby neighborhood.
The attackers began arguing with Jaramana’s Druze security guards about an alleged audio clip of Marwan Kiwan, a Druze cleric, insulting the Prophet Muhammad, which had spread on social media the previous day. Although Kiwan denied being the person in the audio, the anger led to clashes on the outskirts of Damascus and sparked sectarian attacks on university students. Simultaneously, battles broke out on the outskirts of Sahnaya and Ashrafieh, spreading toward Sweida and Mount Hermon when a convoy of Druze militias headed toward Damascus to support their community.
“The clash was right over our heads. I felt like I was going to die,” said one woman living near the checkpoint at the southern entrance to Jaramana, in an area that has now been largely abandoned by its residents. “I spent two days sick and exhausted. We became afraid. We are just a group [of people] who came here to live. We don’t want anything more. We don’t want to fight, confront, terrorize, or raise weapons against anyone. That’s not our concern. We just want to live.” She asked to remain anonymous due to fears of retaliation.
In response to the attack, local Druze — who had been integrated into the Syrian Ministry of Defence following clashes in the same neighborhood in March — and other armed individuals took up guns to repel the assault, which was contained to the southern checkpoint.
“The clashes continued for two days. We were sitting at home, unable to leave. When things got worse, we took shelter at our neighbors’ house,” said the woman, standing next to the checkpoint where the clashes occurred. “They [the Druze security] told us to stay inside so we wouldn’t get hurt. They didn’t approach us. They said, ‘We are brothers and we must remain united. We won’t come near you, but stay inside to stay safe.’”
According to Faris, a 59-year-old local doctor who treated the wounded, more than 30 casualties arrived at his hospital during the fighting. “Many injured people came to the hospital. Some needed surgeries and some died. Some of the surgeries were on the stomach, head, legs or arms. There were eight dead from our people from Jaramana in the hospital and seven from the side of the attackers. There were many armed groups from Mleiha, a nearby neighborhood,” he said.
Since the fall of Bashar al-Assad’s regime, the new government led by Ahmad al-Shaara has struggled to fully control the whole of the country, including the Kurdish-led, self-administered region in the northeast, the Druze heartlands in the south and the outskirts of Damascus. The chaos created during the fall of the regime and subsequent abandonment of weaponry led different neighborhoods to organize their own security. This has created tensions between the Druze community and the new government, and led to conflict at the end of February, preceding the latest round of fighting.
According to official sources, the Syrian army, under the control of the Ministry of Defence, then intervened to separate the groups. Only guns from the Druze side were confiscated, however, after an agreement between the main leaders of the Druze community and the government. Yet many other members of the community are resisting the government’s demands to surrender weapons. Inside a local shop in Jaramana, Sheikh Ahmad Ali Seineldin, a spiritual and social leader for the minority group whose decisions are listened to and followed by the community, told New Lines that while the Druze of Jaramana want to be part of a united Syria, “our weapons are for self-defense, which is a legitimate right anywhere in the world. As long as armed factions and unruly groups remain armed, we cannot give up our weapons. The weapons should stay with the town’s residents under official state supervision.”
On the evening of April 28, fighting spread to the towns of Ashrafieh and Sahnaya — also home to many of Syria’s Druze. These neighborhoods saw the most brutal sectarian fighting of the three days of battle. On May 1, Hussam Warwar, the mayor of the town, and his son were murdered after being shot by unknown men, who appeared intent on jeopardizing a ceasefire agreement signed with the Damascus authorities just hours earlier.
According to paramedics interviewed by New Lines who were working in these towns during the fighting, access to the wounded was frequently restricted. One of the paramedics who was present in Ashrafieh and Sahnaya was beaten on the back at a checkpoint by an unknown armed group; others, despite being clearly identified by their reflective ambulance gear, were questioned about their sect before being allowed to proceed.
“Before the General Security entered, the affiliation of the armed groups was still unclear,” said one Druze source who participated in negotiation talks with the government. “They engaged in indiscriminate shootings, killed around five identified civilians, and committed acts of robbery, theft and incited sectarian hatred, particularly targeting the Druze community. This, despite Sahnaya being widely known for its diverse mix of Sunnis, Alawites, Shiites, Druze and Christians from all over the country. The attacks, however, targeted the Druze. It was an organized assault by reckless, lawless elements, and I don’t believe their leadership was Syrian in any real sense.”
New Lines contacted the Ministries of Health and Defense for an accurate number of casualties during the three days of skirmishes but received no response by the time of publication. The Syrian Observatory for Human Rights reported over 100 fatalities.
On the evening of April 30, a deal was reached between Druze community leaders, the governor and security agencies. The agreement allowed government forces to enter Ashrafieh and Sahnaya to implement a ceasefire between factions.
“The government’s behavior is part of a broader strategy to centralize power and retake or consolidate areas that are not in control of the government. The government blames extremists for the violence, and then it says, ‘We’ll take control to pacify things,’” said Joseph Daher, a political economist and author of the book “Syria after the Uprisings: The Political Economy of State Resilience.” “Sectarianism … serves to distract the popular classes from socioeconomic and political issues by scapegoating a particular group, defined by sect or ethnicity, as the root of the country’s problems and a security threat, thereby justifying repressive and discriminatory policies against it,” he explained.
At a high-security wing inside one of the main hospitals in central Damascus lay some of the injured people from April’s clashes. The patients, many of whom narrowly escaped with their lives, were under constant surveillance by heavily armed security forces. Among them was Kareem, a Druze detainee.
“I was walking toward my car, and suddenly it all happened — an explosion occurred near me. I woke up later in the hospital and couldn’t remember anything,” he recounted. Kareem has since undergone two emergency surgeries to remove shrapnel from one of his legs.
There followed a standoff between the security forces and the prisoners. “The Druze are currently fighting solely in the name of their sect, whereas the General Security forces have moved beyond such sectarian matters,” yelled one of the armed officials working for the Ministry of Interior. “The international community has not helped us and will not help us. All they do is film and make noise in the media.” Before anyone could say anything else, a voice in the background put an end to the interview: “Who gave you permission to speak with these people? They are terrorists, not civilians!”
According to security forces at the hospital and the Ministry of Interior, the individuals interviewed by New Lines were Druze fighters involved in an attack on a checkpoint staffed by General Security. They claimed to possess video footage obtained from a nearby building as evidence. However, the video was never shown because permission to view it was denied by the commander overseeing the detainees.
New Lines spoke with three independent sources familiar with Kareem, all of whom said that he was at work on the day of the attack. Reporters also visited the site where Kareem was allegedly injured and observed a crater in the ground consistent with damage caused by an explosive device. This aligns with local accounts and photos published in Syrian Telegram channels claiming that small drones carrying improvised explosives were being flown in the neighborhood. It is unclear who was controlling the drones, although rebel troops, who now form the ranks of Syria’s new army, commonly used drones to attack Assad’s forces when they were fighting against the regime from their stronghold of Idlib.
Kareem was released from police custody days after his arrest for interrogation, indicating that he was likely an unarmed civilian.
The attacks come at a time when confidence is waning in the new Syrian government’s ability to navigate the aftermath of the civil war. The more such attacks occur, particularly those targeting minorities, the greater the risk of renewed armed conflict in a country that is inherently diverse.
The Druze community, like others, remains divided in its stance toward the new leadership. While Druze residents in Damascus are more inclined to align with the government, those in the southern provinces of Sweida and Quneitra — the Druze heartland in the country — are more hesitant after having built up their autonomy from the old regime. Still, what all Druze factions seem to agree on is the need to retain their weapons, at least for now.
“This government does not work for all Syrians, only for the Sunnis,” said one Druze sheikh from Ashrafieh. “Our region is very diverse, with many religions living together. Ashrafieh is a geographic zone where we live in integration. That’s why we cannot simply say we reject the government.”
Although the fighting has subsided, a tense calm lingers in neighborhoods now patrolled by General Security forces. The presence of the mostly Sunni forces has caused unease among residents. “Most of the security forces deployed in Sahnaya and Ashrafieh are Sunni, whereas the people in these neighborhoods come from a variety of sects. We need security forces that reflect the area’s diversity, not just Druze, because this is a place where all religions live together. We have repeatedly asked the government for this, but we’ve received no response,” said the sheikh.
“The civil war is happening right now. With extremists in the security forces, the war will not stop. We need the government to listen to the people, to spread justice and to be democratic,” he concluded.
In Sweida, Druze Sheikh Hikmat al-Hijiri, a prominent leader of the sect, called for international protection for the Syrian Druze. “We no longer trust a body that claims to be a government because the government does not kill its people,” he said in a public statement on May 1. “It is necessary, and with immediate effect, for international forces to intervene to maintain peace and prevent the continuation of these crimes.”
Meanwhile, Druze armed groups in the south have picked up guns to confront the government. One of them is the Sweida Military Council, formed in February by former soldiers of Bashar al-Assad’s regime. “There is no negotiating with this ruling gang — not today, not tomorrow. They are murderers. Sweida is bleeding today because of their crimes,” said Amer Alba, a commander of the council, via phone, referring to al-Sharaa’s government. “We will burn them and drive them into hell [because], if we don’t intervene, you will see thousands of martyrs.”
As fighting raged on the outskirts of Damascus, Israel entered the scene, shelling General Security military targets stationed in Sahnaya. At approximately 4 p.m. on April 29, Israel bombed Syrian Ministry of Defence assets, ostensibly to defend the Druze population. According to a statement by Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and Defence Minister Israel Katz, the Israeli military had carried out “a warning operation and struck an extremist group” as it prepared to continue an attack on Druze in Sahnaya.
On March 1, Netanyahu and Katz claimed to be protecting the Druze residing in Jaramana when Israel bombed the neighborhood after two days of clashes between Druze resistance and government forces. “The main Druze social and political actors have largely rejected [Israeli intervention] and reaffirmed their loyalty to Syria and the country’s unity,” Daher said. However, there are fears Israel is nevertheless exploiting this cover for its own ends, expanding its occupation of the Golan Heights and capturing key observation posts in the mountains, giving it a strategic advantage in the region and in its efforts to prevent a Hezbollah resurgence in Lebanon, while also seizing key water resources and gaining influence over the process of political transition in Syria. Since the fall of al-Assad on Dec. 8, Israel has carried out more than 600 strikes against military assets belonging to the old regime, with the stated aim of demilitarizing southern Syria.
Despite Israel’s claims to be protecting the Druze community, however, a guided missile fired from an Israeli drone reportedly killed four Syrian Druze from Sweida on May 2. The incident raised questions among Druze about Israel’s intentions toward the community. On the same day, another Israeli airstrike near the presidential palace was widely interpreted as a warning to al-Shaara to steer clear of the southern countryside, further escalating tensions in the region.
Little Ibrahim, who experienced the attack in Sahnaya, is now one of the over 4,000 Druze who have fled Damascus to a town bordering the Israeli-occupied Golan Heights, where no pro-Damascus forces are allowed. Nearly a third of the residents of the small village in the south have been internally displaced by recent conflict. “People stay at locals’ houses. Some houses are hosting 30 people. We have no services like water, electricity, roads or a sewage network,” said 39-year-old Emad Hassoun, mayor of the village.
One of the recently displaced individuals, Wael, was injured in a drone strike in Sahnaya. He described the scene: “There were 15 of us in the square. Some were injured, others were killed. The drone hovered above us — no one was armed,” he said.
New Lines has not independently verified Wael’s account, but it aligns with reports from similar incidents during the assault on Ashrafieh.
Wael said his cousin was killed in the strike, and his brother was critically wounded. He added that, while rushing his brother to the hospital, he saw security forces begin arresting patients in the emergency ward. “General Security officers were insulting Druze people inside the hospital. While my brother was undergoing emergency surgery, I hid my own injured hand and fled.” Wael’s hand is now swollen due to the shrapnel from the explosion. The remoteness of the town and the lack of medical facilities make it extremely difficult for other injured people to receive medical care. “We don’t go to Sunni areas, we are afraid.”
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