Deadly church attack raises security fears for Syrians, minorities

Al Jazeera

3 days ago

Sunday's deadly attack on the Mar Elias Church in Damascus has shaken Syria, and particularly the country's Christians.
The attack on Sunday killed at least 25 people, after a man with a rifle entered the church and shot at worshippers, before detonating a suicide bomb. It has raised questions about the ability of the new Syrian government to manage security in the country and protect its citizens, including those from minority groups.
The Syrian Interior Ministry blamed ISIL (ISIS) for the attack, though another group called Saraya Ansar al-Sunna later claimed it. Government officials described the attack as an attempt to undermine their efforts to establish a state following the fall of longtime dictator Bashar al-Assad in December.
'Sedition is happening,' Hind Kabawat, Syria's Social and Labour Affairs minister, told Syria TV from a Damascus hospital, as she fought back tears. 'All Christians and Muslims and all Syrians need to be strong today. This is a big wound, and our pain is big.'
Fears in Syria
While the target of the attack was a church – the first of its kind against a Syrian church since the fall of the al-Assad regime – it serves as a reminder of the precarious security situation the country still finds itself in, affecting all Syrians, as the government attempts to provide stability.
'It's very dangerous,' Abu Hassan, a Damascus resident, told Al Jazeera by phone. He said that he was wary of more attacks taking place as part of an attempt to sow disunity between Syria's Christians and Muslims.
'[The attacks] won't disappear,' he said. 'There will be more blood. May God protect this country.'
The end of the al-Assad regime, following a more than 13-year war in which hundreds of thousands died, was welcomed by most Syrians. The al-Assad dynasty – Bashar had been preceded as president by his father Hafez – had effectively built one of the world's most brutal police states, with a vast network of competing security and intelligence branches that terrorised much of the local population.
The man who has replaced Bashar al-Assad as president is Ahmed al-Sharaa. His own background – as a former member of al-Qaeda who led the now-disbanded Hayat Tahrir al-Sham in the latter years of the war – led many Syrians to express doubts and concerns over his rule of such a religiously and ethnically diverse state.
Al-Sharaa has repeatedly promised to protect minorities and build an inclusive state for Syrians of all backgrounds and religions. But a series of events in the interim has sown distrust between the ruling authorities and some members of religious minority groups.
Massacres committed in the Alawite-dominated coastal region in March, followed by clashes between government-affiliated forces and Druze militias in May, rocked some of the goodwill and faith the new authorities had built up.
The Mar Elias Church attack is, of course, different in that it was perpetrated by an enemy of the new government. But it has still contributed to the doubt felt by some that the security situation in Syria can improve – particularly, although not exclusively, for minorities.
And that uncertainty is even pushing some minorities to consider that they may have to abandon their homes in Syria and leave the country.
For many observers, ultimately, the buck stops with the authorities.
'The government will be judged based on what they are doing and how they solve the [security] issue,' Jerome Drevon, the International Crisis Group's senior analyst on jihad and modern conflict, told Al Jazeera, 'including the issue of religious minorities and how they protect them'.
Need for justice
The government has said that it was able to thwart two other planned attacks by the same cell that was behind the Mar Elias attack, one of which was going to target a Shia Muslim shrine in Damascus.
ISIL has yet to claim the attack, but is reportedly making inroads in Syria. The group had controlled vast swathes of territory in Syria and Iraq as part of its self-declared 'caliphate' before a United States-led campaign defeated it in 2019, and forced its remnants to the peripheries.
Drevon said that the group had been mostly present in Syria's eastern desert in recent years, until US air strikes and Syrian government expansion led them to push into cities.
ISIL now acts less as a hierarchical organisation and more as a network of independent cells, Drevon said, making it difficult to fully eradicate it.
'There is to some extent a security vacuum because there are not enough forces to man the full country,' Drevon said.
Still, there is also room for positivity. Drevon noted that the government has had some success quelling insurgents and, as collaboration with foreign governments improves, so too will its intelligence and ability to thwart local attacks.
'There are cases of violence, of course, but the level of violence is very far from what we expected six months ago,' Drevon said. 'Even Western countries can't fully prevent armed attacks.'
Analysts say Syrian authorities have been focused not just on preventing attacks from groups like ISIL, but also on stopping domestic insurrections, much like the one along Syria's coast in March sparked by supporters of al-Assad, which then descended into sectarian killing and massacres.
Additionally, the new authorities are trying to improve their intelligence capabilities and means of collaborating and receiving intelligence from foreign countries. Drevon said it was important for foreign governments to collaborate with the new administration on intelligence to confront what is likely to be a growing threat from ISIL in the coming months.
But beyond the question of the state's capacity to fight radical groups is also the importance of amplifying the message that religious and ethnic minorities are equal citizens in Syria, said Robin Yassin-Kassab, a Syrian writer.
The overthrow of al-Assad was popular among Syrians, and the months that have followed have allowed for a new narrative of unity to emerge in the country. But that can quickly go away – particularly if people do not feel that justice is being carried out for the victims of all crimes, including ones committed by those aligned with the state.
After the violence on the coast and in heavily Druze-populated areas, al-Sharaa's government formed committees to investigate and assign responsibility for the violence and deaths. The new authorities have occasionally also arrested people accused of perpetrating or coordinating violence.
But some Syrians still don't feel there is a transparent process or messaging in distributing justice clearly, fairly and equally.
'[There is] no clear message that perpetrators will be arrested and punished for committing crimes and it doesn't matter which political group or what identity, sect or regime, you are affiliated with, you will be punished,' Yassin-Kassab told Al Jazeera. 'That's still not clear.'