Dilemma in Damascus: What next for Syria after Suweida violence?

The ground in Syria has fundamentally shifted following days of escalating fighting in the southern region of Suweida.

The conflagration began as communal clashes between Bedouin and Druze communities following the reported kidnapping of a Druze man by Bedouin gunmen on 11 July.

Over the subsequent days, a cycle of reciprocal attacks raged, until Damascus announced the intervention of its security forces last Monday, in what was nominally a peacekeeping operation.

However, the result was the exact opposite of peacekeeping, as government forces quickly became entangled with Druze militias, and violations committed by government-affiliated forces emerged online.

The Druze spiritual leader Hikmat Al-Hijri reversed his initial acceptance of Damascus’ intervention, instead calling on the Druze to “confront this barbaric campaign”.

Israel soon intervened, launching a blistering campaign of airstrikes against government forces, ostensibly to protect the Druze minority, that culminated in the bombing of the Ministry of Defence building in the heart of Damascus.

By Wednesday evening, a US-mediated ceasefire had been agreed, with government forces withdrawing from the region, and Syrian President Ahmad Al-Sharaa announcing in a televised address that he would “assign local factions and Druze religious leaders the responsibility for maintaining security in Suweida”.

However, on Thursday, retaliatory killings targeting Bedouin communities in Suweida sparked a general mobilisation of the Bedouin tribes, heralding that the conflict is far from over.

What is behind the violence?

Tensions in Suweida between Bedouin and Druze had been building for months, “reflecting a continuity of chronic insecurity across southern Syria that has persisted since before the fall of the former regime,” Aymenn Al-Tamimi, a British-Iraqi translator and historian specialising in Syria, told The New Arab.

Many of the state's basic security functions collapsed in southern Syria during the civil war, with criminality becoming prevalent as the regions of Suweida and Daraa grew into key captagon smuggling routes into Jordan and the Gulf.

Following the fall of the regime in December, Damascus and Druze leaders agreed upon a security settlement which forbade government security services from entering the province, and left the Druze militias as the primary security providers in the region.

However, these militias refused to extend their security umbrella into the Bedouin communities, fearing their presence could spark communal violence. As a result, many Bedouin villages on the fringes of the province were left as pseudo-lawless spaces that were frequently penetrated by outside actors who entered to commit violence.

These acts served to deepen suspicions between the communities and would sporadically set off a cycle of communal recriminatory attacks. This is what happened on 11 July, except this time, local notables were unable to rein in the escalatory cycle before it was too late.

Things worsened after a government “miscalculation that they could keep solving Syria’s security crises by coercive means alone,” Nanar Hawach, Senior Analyst at the International Crisis Group, told TNA.

The security services had previously deployed into the Damascus suburbs of Jaramana and Ashrafiyat Sahnaya to quell communal violence between Sunni and Druze at the end of April.

However, this time their forces were quickly implicated in severe violations. Videos emerged online of the execution and public humiliation of prisoners and civilians. One video depicts fighters shaving off the moustache of 80-year-old Sheikh Marhej Shaheen in the village of Al-Thaala.

In the old quarter of Suweida city, 18 members of the Al-Rawad family were murdered in their home on Tuesday.

Hawach identifies one of the root causes of these violations as the government's “exclusive approach to governance and failure to adequately integrate minorities within its security apparatus”.

He argues this serves to “embolden” actors who feel they have a close affiliation with the centre of power in Damascus to commit violations without the risk of accountability, at the expense of those groups who have been marginalised in Syria’s new power structure.

These violations have only “served to send a message to the armed factions, that their only leverage lies in their weapons”.

Impact on the government

The Syrian government “finds itself in a weakened position having overplayed its hand and suffered a serious military defeat” in Suweida over the last several days," explains Al-Tamimi.

Government forces withdrew after “taking heavy losses from the Israeli airstrikes and resistance on the ground,” he adds, which he believes will now strengthen Israel’s hand to dictate terms in southern Syria.

This ceasefire was in essence a return to the security settlement that was in place before the fighting, which forbade government security services from entering the region, except, “what was once a diplomatic pact reached mutually between the two sides is now a military settlement backed up by Israeli airpower,” says Al-Tamimi.

This heavily limits the government's room for manoeuvre in the region and is likely to embolden the Druze to seek more favourable conditions. Sheikh Hikmat Al-Hijri has begun calling for corridors to be opened between Suweida, Jordan, and the Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF) in the country’s northeast, respectively.

According to Al-Tamimi, one of the most significant outcomes is that it dealt a “blow to the idea that the government firmly imposing its control over the whole country is a matter of inevitability”.

This has major implications for the government's negotiations with the SDF over the future of the country’s north-east, which remains in their hands, and have stalled in recent months. “[the SDF] will look at this and think if these sectarian violations happen even when they are invited in, why should we disarm”.

However, the flip side is that the government, having witnessed how potentially damaging such a military option can be, may be more reluctant to enforce a military solution on the SDF.

For the Druze, there is a perception that the threat is now “existential,” argues Makram Rabah, Assistant Professor of History at the American University of Beirut, which has had the effect of “uniting the Druze militias” in the face of the threat, despite bickering between the leadership.

This weakens Ahmed Al-Sharaa’s chances of reaching a political settlement whilst fighting is ongoing, he adds.

What comes next?

Following the announcement of the ceasefire and the withdrawal of government forces from the region, a string of what Hawach describes as “systematic killings” were committed by Druze forces on Bedouin communities throughout Thursday.

On Friday morning, the leaders of several Bedouin tribes announced a general mobilisation, as armed columns began moving south from across the country. The scale of the mobilisation appears significant, with tribal groups mobilised across several provinces.

Sheikh Hikmat Al-Hijri has subsequently reversed his denunciation of government forces entering the region, instead demanding, via sources speaking to Al-Jazeera, that Damascus send peacekeeping forces to the region.

“What happens next depends upon whether the government allows these formations to pass,” argues Hawach.

However, it remains unclear if the government has the capacity to stop the tribal fighters. They could attempt to physically block their passage on the roads, which itself could be inflammatory, or lean on the Bedouin leadership to recall its men.

On Saturday, Syrian interior ministry forces began deploying in Suweida as part of a US-brokered deal to prevent further Israeli military intervention in the province.

Despite Al-Sharaa announcing an "immediate ceasefire" which he called on all parties to “fully respect”, the truce remains fragile, with rocket fire and gunfire reported between Bedouin and Druze fighters.

The Israeli dimension also remains unclear. They could restart their air campaign in ‘defence’ of the Druze and may hold Damascus culpable for failing to halt the mobilisation of the Bedouin.

Damascus now finds itself standing under an international spotlight, stuck in the middle of a raging blood vendetta far more severe than anyone could have predicted. How it responds may be a defining moment for this young government.

Cian Ward is a journalist based in Beirut, covering conflict, migration, and humanitarian issues

Follow him on X: @CP__Ward