Violence against the Druze in Syria

The Society for Threatened Peoples (STP) warns that the Islamist regime in Damascus is planning a large-scale attack against the Druze minority in the south of the country. “Three months after the massacres against the Alawite people in the west of Syria, the new leaders are putting more pressure on the Druze in the southern province of Suwayda. Almost every day, members of the Druze are killed or abducted – and the access roads are blocked, so that the people do not have access to food, gasoline, or diesel,” reported Dr. Kamal Sido, the STP’s Middle East consultant, in Göttingen today. 

“In order to prepare the Sunni population for an attack against the minority group, the new leaders are agitating against the Druze, accusing them of cooperating with Israel and other foreign powers. In fact, the former militiamen who are now in power in Damascus have been calling for foreign military interventions – for example by Turkey – themselves since 2011. Jihadists from all over the world are brought to Syria to support the Islamist cause,” Sido pointed out. “Now, these jihadists are supposed to be integrated into the Syrian Army and the police forces by the thousands, with support from the United States, although they were involved in many crimes – killings and rape, for example – against Yazidis, Shiites, and Christians. The jihadists are a threat not only the Druze, but also to the entire Syrian population: They do not speak Arabic or other local languages, and they are not familiar with the other cultures of Syria.”

As the international community is hardly interested in the fate of the Druze in Syria, and since the war crimes against them are not on the agenda of any international organizations, the Druze are now putting their last hopes on Israel. The around 150,000 Druze living there are not going to let down their brothers and sisters in Syria. They are calling on the state of Israel to protect the Druze in Syria from a possible genocide – if necessary by means of military force.

The Druze are a religious community in the Middle East. Globally, there are around one million Druze – most of them living in Syria, Lebanon, Israel, and Jordan. They call themselves “al-Muwahhidun” (Monotheists). Another name that the Druze ascribe to themselves is “Bani Maaroof”, which could be translated to “people of good deeds”. The majority of the Druze, but also the other minority groups in Syria as well as many women and Sunni democrats, do not trust the new men in power in Damascus. “The Islamists are against a liberal state. They are trying to establish a totalitarian religious state, similar to Iran – only not Shiite, but Sunni,” Sido reported. From the beginning of April to mid-May, he visited Jordan, Syria, and Israel and spoke to many members of minority groups.