...
By Jennifer Cunningham and Tom O'Connor
0
Share
Newsweek is a Trust Project member
See more of our trusted coverage when you search.Prefer Newsweek on Googleto see more of our trusted coverage when you search.
As President Donald Trump and his administration strive to build a partnership with Syrian President Ahmad al-Sharaa, the spiritual head of Israel's Druze community is calling on the United States to take action in support of minority rights, including those of Syria’s own Druze.
Speaking to Newsweek in Tel Aviv, Sheikh Muwaffaq Tarif shared an impression of the new Syrian government that did not align with the positive perception from the White House, which just last month hosted the former Islamist militant chief who toppled longtime Syrian President Bashar al-Assad a year ago.
While Sharaa's recent trip to Washington marked one of many milestones in his yearlong effort to transform his image into one of a pragmatic statesman, his promises to usher in a more inclusive and peaceful era for his war-torn nation have been undermined by reports of violence and persecution against minorities, including the Druze.
Read More on World
The bloodshed that erupted earlier this year, in which tribal fighters and state-aligned security forces clashed with Druze factions, drew direct strikes against Syrian government forces by Israel. But Tarif said the U.S. could play a particularly influential role if it chose to step up.
"We're asking the United States as the biggest country in the world, the main country, to do something that the Syrian government won't harm any minorities, not just the Druze, the Druze, the Christians, the Yazidis, the Alawites, all the minorities that have been attacked by the government," Tarif said.
In a direct appeal to the White House, Tarif called on Trump "to try to understand that what's happening there is something horrible, and to interfere, shut it down."
...
New Frontlines of an Old War
The sudden fall of Assad's government last December in an 11-day offensive led by Sharaa's Hayat Tahrir al-Sham faction sent shock waves across the nation and the region. The victorious Sharaa, long known by his nom de guerre Abu Mohammed al-Golani, quickly ascended to the presidency, marking the most dramatic shift yet in the nation's 14-year civil war.
For many Syrians, the news was met with celebration. The former government, led by Assad since 2000 and his father before him since 1971, had been widely accused of corruption and war crimes. The swift nature of Sharaa's consolidation of power brought a sigh of relief to those fearing the state's collapse could bring about even worse anarchy.
Virtually overnight, one of the Middle East's most feared militants, a former associate of the Islamic State (ISIS) and Al-Qaeda, had emerged as Syria's greatest hope for change.
Yet concerns lingered over his intentions upon assuming power, particularly among minority communities of the majority-Sunni Muslim and Arab nation. These fears were realized as clashes broke out across several regions.
"For the past years when Assad was the head of Syria, all the Syrian people suffered, not just the Druze," Tarif said. "We had this hope that when this new government would come, under Sharaa, that all Syrian people would feel better and have a good life. And it's not that way."
In the coastal provinces of the west, once-rebel militias now acting under the banner of the new government launched an operation that largely targeted Alawites, a religious sect of which the Assad family was a member. The campaign was framed as a battle against Assad government loyalists, some of whom took up arms to resist the new administration, though international rights groups and media outlets described a massacre in which at least 1,500 people were killed, most of them believed to be civilians.
Across the north and east, combat erupted between the opposition-turned-government factions and Kurdish-led groups operating as part of the U.S.-backed Syrian Democratic Forces. The new Trump administration moved quickly to secure a deal in March that would see its top ally in the fight against ISIS agree to integrate under Damascus' command, though the deal has since stalled and tensions remain high.
Unrest also came to the largely Druze province of Sweida in the southwest and the Damascus suburbs of Jaramana and Sahnaya beginning in April. As lightly armed Druze militias battled both tribal leaders and security forces sent to restore order, reports surfaced of widespread abuses by Damascus' forces, including sexual assault, torture and murder.
"Instead of going to Sweida and proving to the world that they are coming in with new faces to be known for peace, to bring order, instead of coming and giving flowers to each family, they came in, they burned the houses, they raped, they kidnapped, they killed more than 2,136 Druze in Sweida itself," Tarif said.
"They came inside with tanks, with bombing drones—they did all these things," Tarif added. "It was a massacre that was in Sweida."
...
Israel Steps In
Israel responded to the violence forcefully. Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu ordered strikes against Syrian military personnel and sites, including the Syrian Defense Ministry in Damascus, and warned of further measures if the violence did not abate.
Some, including influential far-right National Security Minister Itamar Ben-Gvir, even suggested targeting Sharaa himself as "the head of the snake."
The grisly scenes emerging from neighboring Syria also set off a firestorm among members of Israel's Druze community, some of whom serve with the Israel Defense Forces (IDF) and have been in active combat against the Islamist Palestinian Hamas movement since the group's deadly October 7, 2023, attack that sparked a regional conflict. A number of Israeli Druze even crossed the de facto border to join the fight in Syria.
Tarif, for his part, asserted that the broader Druze community would not stand idly by in the face of such hostilities.
"We're going to fight until death," Tarif said. "We're not going to let them harm the Druze anymore, not in Syria, not in Lebanon, not in Israel."
The Israeli role adds another layer of complexity to the shifting geopolitical tides that have emerged over the regional war surrounding Gaza and the fall of Assad. Sharaa's assault to topple Assad came after Israel had heavily damaged the forces of the old Syrian leader's traditional ally, the fellow Iran-aligned Hezbollah of Lebanon. Netanyahu initially took credit for aiding in his foe's ouster.
Yet the Israeli premier has greeted the rise of Sharaa with caution. Shortly after Assad fled to Moscow, Israel ordered a large-scale bombing campaign to neutralize former Syrian military sites and sent IDF personnel to seize Syrian territory beyond the occupied Golan Heights.
The Druze question has emerged as a central factor. Israeli President Isaac Herzog also addressed the issue in a recent interview with Newsweek, during which he spoke to his "dream" of reconciliation with the Arab world.
“We realize the internal tension in Syria between the factions,” Herzog said at the time. “We’ve seen what happened in Sweida, and we have certain prerequisites, for example, an open corridor, so that we can help our brothers and sisters, the Druze, if necessary. But on the other hand, I think it’s also a huge opportunity to change the regional map and draw a new equilibrium.
“And I think if we can reach an agreement with Syria, I would not say yet a peace agreement, but an agreement with Syria, which will follow the agreement which took place in 1973 following the war, but now a new agreement which gives more relations and contact, it would be fantastic."
...
The Washington-Damascus Gambit
Israel's tough approach toward Sharaa's administration, particularly its ongoing strikes, has drawn rare criticism from the White House, including direct warnings from Trump not to undermine Syria's stability.
In a recent statement shared with Newsweek, a White House official said that "President Trump is committed to supporting a Syria that is stable, unified, and at peace with itself and its neighbors," a goal that constitutes "a key element of the President’s vision for a peaceful and prosperous Middle East."
"A stable and sovereign Syria is critical for the region’s stability," the White House official said. "Syria must not become a base for terrorism or pose a threat to its neighbors and the wider world."
The White House official also cited Trump's remarks following his meeting with Sharaa last month in which the U.S. leader wrote that the U.S. "is very satisfied with the results displayed, through hard work and determination, in the Country of Syria," noting that the administration was "doing everything within our power to make sure the Government of Syria continues to do what was intended, which is substantial, in order to build a true and prosperous Country."
"One of the things that has helped them greatly was [President Trump’s] termination of very strong and biting sanctions," the post continued.
In separate comments later provided to Newsweek in response to Tarif's remarks, a U.S. State Department spokesperson said, "We encourage all Syrian communities to engage in good faith efforts to build a representative government that is transparent and accountable to the Syrian people. "
Those close to the new Syrian government have also hailed the lifting of sanctions as a key measure to unlock the nation's economic potential and set the stage for a thaw in ties between Washington and Damascus. At the same time, key figures also acknowledge that Sharaa's administration faced a significant task in managing the interests of various groups that helped bring him to power.
As Mahmoud Toron, business and economic adviser to the Syrian government, recently told Newsweek, "the status of the various groups that joined President Sharaa’s broad coalition to overthrow Assad remains one of the most sensitive and closely watched elements of Syria’s internal landscape."
Toron, who has previously accused Israel of attempting to sabotage Sharaa’s bid to stabilize the country during the Sweida clashes in July, said since then “the government’s efforts to consolidate control and rebuild a unified national army are progressing relatively well.”
A key factor he identified in this effort was balancing the various interests and orientations of these factions that now constitute stakeholders in Syria's new political landscape.
"Given the diverse ideological backgrounds of the groups involved—ranging from nationalist factions to elements with more Islamist orientations—concerns naturally persist regarding their alignment with President Sharaa’s policies," Toron said, "especially his outreach to Western states and his engagement in security dialogue with Israel."
Still, he had confidence that the government was ultimately on the right track, pointing to how security forces were able to quickly calm tensions following the death of a couple in a majority-Alawite neighborhood of Syria's third-largest city, Homs, thus avoiding the kind of broader sectarian strife that occurred earlier this year.
Thus, Toron said, "a potentially explosive confrontation was contained before it escalated into the type of sectarian violence that characterized earlier phases of the conflict," demonstrating "growing discipline within the armed forces, improved chain-of-command responsiveness, and a heightened awareness of the catastrophic risks posed by uncontrolled local clashes."
"Overall," he said, "these developments reflect a clear determination by President Sharaa’s administration to prevent any recurrence of sectarian fragmentation and to ensure that the transitional period proceeds without major security disruptions."
Newsweek has reached out to the Syrian Information Ministry and the U.S. State Department for comment.
...
Getting the World's Attention
From Tarif's perspective, however, the Syrian government's performance remains far from satisfactory as long as insecurity prevails over the livelihoods of Syria's Druze community.
And while he is grateful for the many donors, including the Israeli government, who have chipped in to aid the Druze cause in Syria, he also expressed frustration over what he viewed to be "the hypocrisy of the world, and especially those humanitarian organizations that each day bring into Gaza about 600 trucks full of humanitarian aid, but when asked to do something in Syria, those same organizations said that they can't do anything."
Among the paradoxes of the situation he cited was that humanitarian groups would not move on the issue until it was declared a "disaster area," something only the Syrian government itself had the authority to do and, according to Tarif, "had no interest in."
This frustration also extends to the White House, whose decision to not only welcome Sharaa with open arms but also begin lifting Assad-era sanctions and remove both the new Syrian leader and his Hayat Tahrir al-Sham group from U.S.-designated terrorist lists, Tarif felt, was premature.
"Before you took away these sanctions, why didn't you ask him for guarantees?" Tarif asked—a question directed to Trump. "Why not, if he doesn't guarantee, then do it step-by-step, not just at once. Now, today, he has no sanctions. He can do anything. He's the so-called president of Syria and actually doing the same that he did before."
It's a fight he intends to continue at every level, given the dire stakes for his community.
"We have to defend ourselves, we can't let it go anymore," Tarif said. "We've suffered. We've been suffering from the past almost five months, but also since years. They raped our locals. They kidnapped them. They cut the mustache of the Druze, which in our belief, when you cut the mustache of a sheikh, it's better that you die."
"And we are seeking for help for the past five months from everybody, even the U.S. government, the EU, the U.N., everybody," he added. "Yet nobody understands what is happening in Syria."
Update 4:32 p.m. ET: This article has been updated to include comments provided by a U.S. State Department spokesperson.
View 0 Comments
Submit Correction
View Editorial & AI Guidelines