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The National
an hour ago
- The National
Israel's attack on Syria makes a bad situation much worse
Israel attacked the Syrian army headquarters on Wednesday, ostensibly in defence of Syria's Druze community. 'We are working to save our Druze brothers and to eliminate the regime's gangs,' said Israel's Prime Minister, Benjamin Netanyahu, as smoke rose over the Syrian capital. It was later confirmed that army general command and the defence ministry were badly damaged. Israel's strikes have caused widespread alarm in the region and further afield, with the EU calling for Israel to 'fully respect Syria's sovereignty'. The UAE condemned the attacks as a dangerous escalation. Israel's broader intervention distorts an already complex picture and was predicated on accusing Syrian authorities of systematic persecution of the Druze. It now appears closely interested in destabilising the Syrian government. Recent days have seen deadly clashes between Druze militiamen and Bedouin tribes in southern Syria, which have worsened into large-scale violence centred in the city of Sweida. On Tuesday, right-wing Israeli minister Amichai Chikli called for Syria's President Ahmad Al Shara to be 'eliminated'. Before the Damascus strikes on the following day, Israel had already hit Syrian military convoys in Sweida, killing one Syrian soldier. By Wednesday evening, the Syrian government said it had agreed a ceasefire with representatives of the Druze community. Israel should act as a responsible neighbour to a country embarking on a new chapter The events of the past few days are of grave concern for Syrian authorities, who are trying to unite a country of kaleidoscopic diversity traumatised on a multi-generational level by war. Some Syrian Druze leaders have resisted attempts by the new government to assert control since the fall of the regime of former president Bashar Al Assad in December. Part of this is an unwillingness to cede de-facto autonomy gained in the chaos of the war, but part of it is also a hesitation to accept the authority of an administration with deep Islamist roots. A pattern of assaults against Druze civilians, in particular, poses a major risk of sectarian violence erupting once again in a country that has only just managed to overcome a 14-year civil war. The Druze are not the only minority group who have found themselves attacked. Alawites in northern Syria have faced violence that left more than 1,300 people dead. In Israel, the government should act as a responsible neighbour to a country embarking on a new chapter – one that Mr Al Shara has repeatedly said involves an end to the Assad-era stance of permanent hostility towards surrounding states. Incitements to violence do not serve the Israeli public, which is already exhausted from fighting several wars. Its government would do well to halt any further intervention. A better path is to stay the course in ongoing dialogue with the Syrian government amid the US administration's efforts to bring Syria further into the international fold. Violence was once, not so long ago, a major aspect of life in Syria. But if the new Syria is to succeed, those days must be consigned to history.
Middle East Eye
5 hours ago
- Middle East Eye
With Damascus strikes, Israel seeks to tear up Trump's vision for Syria
Israel and the US appear to be on divergent paths in Syria. While the allies aren't on a collision course yet, current and former Arab, US and Israeli officials say their differences could complicate the Trump administration's grand diplomatic plans. On Wednesday, Israel carried out powerful air strikes on Damascus, blowing up a part of the defence ministry and hitting near the presidential palace, as it framed its attacks as an effort to protect Syria's Druze minority. The strikes marked a significant Israeli escalation against the government of President Ahmed al-Sharaa and came despite his warming ties with the US and his burgeoning security contacts with Israel. "Israel and the US are definitely not on the same page," Dareen Khalifa, a senior advisor at the International Crisis Group, told Middle East Eye. New MEE newsletter: Jerusalem Dispatch Sign up to get the latest insights and analysis on Israel-Palestine, alongside Turkey Unpacked and other MEE newsletters Israel claimed that its attack was in response to requests from Druze inside Israel for intervention, where the minority is around 150,000-strong. Prominent Syrian Druze, Sheikh Hikmat Salaman al-Hajri, who is seen as close to Israel, did in fact call for international support, saying the minority faced a "total war of extermination". Other Syrian Druze leaders, however, have rejected Israel's intervention. "There is definitely genuine Druze pressure inside Israel to intervene," a US diplomat in the region who has been monitoring the fighting told MEE. "Regardless of whether the pressure is real or not, the outcome is the same: a zone of influence for Israel in Syria. That means telling the Syrians where they can and cannot put their tanks." When asked to comment on Israel's strikes and the instability plaguing the war-ravaged country, US President Donald Trump declined to comment and instead deferred reporters to US Secretary of State Marco Rubio. Earlier in the day, Rubio tried to characterise the strikes and worsening security situation as a simple "misunderstanding". 'All roads lead to Damascus' Israel's move to assert itself as the dominant power protecting the Druze in a swath of southern Syria clashes with the visions of the Trump administration. Earlier this year, the US rejected Israeli pleas to keep more troops in northeastern Syria, MEE revealed. Kurdish fighters there are lobbying for more autonomy. The Trump administration wants to reduce its military footprint in Syria and ensure the country - a tapestry of Christians, Muslims, Druze and Kurds - has one undisputed power centre backed up by US allies like Nato member Turkey, cash-rich Qatar and Saudi Arabia. Tom Barrack, Trump's billionaire, Lebanese-American envoy to Syria and ambassador to Turkey, waxed on about Syria just last week in front of reporters. "You have the Druze that want it to be Druze land. You have the Alawites who want it to be Alawite land. You have the Kurds who want it to be Kurdistan," Barrack said. "What Syria is saying, what Damascus is saying, that's not going to happen - all roads lead to Damascus." 'In Netanyahu's mind, undermining the Syrian state is way more important than any normalisation' - Alon Pinkas, former Israeli diplomat "There's not an indication on our part that there's going to be a separate Alawite state or a separate Druze state. There's Syria," he said. To be sure, Syria has been battered by sectarian violence since Sharaa, a former leader of Hay'at Tahrir al-Sham and before that al-Qaeda's Syrian branch, ousted former President Bashar al-Assad last year. In March, Syrian security forces killed hundreds of Alawites - the sect to which Assad belonged - along the Mediterranean coast. In June, at least 25 people were killed in a bombing at Mar Elias Greek Orthodox Church. Sharaa was criticised for his handling of the fallout. While the Trump administration condemned the attacks, it is focused on a speedy lifting of sanctions and assuaging sectarian tensions. Barrack has praised Gulf investments in Syria. And if there is an outside military power that the US has leaned towards recognising in Syria, it is Turkey, experts say. MEE revealed that the US was instrumental in pressing Turkey and Israel to establish a deconfliction line in Syria earlier this year. 'Default mode' For Trump, Gulf investment and Turkish buy-in complement the normalisation of ties between Syria and Israel. When Trump met Sharaa in Riyadh in May, he asked him to join the Abraham Accords - the diplomatic agreements between Israel, Morocco, Bahrain and the UAE that Trump sees as one of his signature foreign policy achievements. Barrack told The New York Times that the US has supported back-channel talks between Israel and Sharaa's government, which have reportedly been held in Baku, Azerbaijan - Turkey's closest ally. The UAE has also mediated talks between the two, according to Reuters. Talk of Syria and Israel striking an agreement reached a crescendo after the 12-day Israel-Iran conflict ended. Posters sprang up in Tel Aviv showing Trump, Netanyahu and Sharaa along with other Arab leaders. How Turkey and Qatar are playing an outsized role in Trump's new Middle East Read More » "This puts to shame the nonsense of normalisation," Alon Pinkas, a former Israeli diplomat, told MEE. "In Netanyahu's mind, undermining the Syrian state is way more important than any normalisation." Diplomats in the region say that the Israeli strikes are a direct rejection of Trump's efforts. "The Israelis will go along with Trump talking peace, but they prefer Syria divided," an Arab diplomat told MEE. "The minute they got the opportunity, they went back to default mode - tear up Syria." Israel's willingness to bomb Damascus as they were talking to the Syrians does reflect a real difference of opinion between the two allies on Sharaa, the US and Arab diplomats told MEE. "The Trump administration has been much more willing to give Sharaa a chance with Turkish and Saudi backing. For the Israelis, Sharaa is not genuine - he is a jihadist," the US diplomat told MEE. After Assad's removal, Israel launched widespread strikes on Syria. Netanyahu sent soldiers to occupy a swath of southwestern Syria that includes a United Nations buffer zone in the Golan Heights. Israel seized much of the strategic plateau in the 1967 war. Arab and US diplomats say the first step to any normalisation would be reinstating a 1974 disengagement agreement that created the buffer zone along the two countries' borders. Some of the biggest advocates of normalisation now say it is in jeopardy. "Israel's unnecessary strikes must cease immediately," Republican Congressman Joe Wilson said on Wednesday, before calling the strikes "suicidal for Israel'.
The National
5 hours ago
- The National
Rubio confident hostilities in Syria 'will end tonight'
US Secretary of State Marco Rubio said on Wednesday that he believes the recent surge of violence in Syria will 'end tonight'. Mr Rubio called the situation, which involves Syrian government forces, Bedouins, the Druze community and Israel, "complex". "These are historic, long-time rivalries between different groups in the south-west of Syria," he told reporters. "And it led to an unfortunate situation and a misunderstanding, it looks like, between the Israeli side and the Syrian side." In a post on X, he called the situation in Syria "troubling and horrifying". Syrian government forces and their militia allies have been engaged in an offensive over the past several days in the mostly Druze governorate of Sweida. Israel regards itself as the traditional protector of the Druze, members of a religious offshoot of Islam with communities spread across the region. In response to the Syrian government's actions in Sweida, the Israeli military launched strikes at Damascus on Wednesday, hitting the Ministry of Defence building, the presidential palace and other sites. The Syrian government has announced a halt to its military offensive in Sweida. Washington has been involved in a diplomatic rush to ease the situation in the region and Mr Rubio said he had spoken with all parties involved. 'We have engaged all the parties involved in the clashes in Syria,' he said on X. 'We have agreed on specific steps that will bring this troubling and horrifying situation to an end tonight. This will require all parties to deliver on the commitments they have made and this is what we fully expect them to do.' It was unclear exactly what were the 'specific steps' to which Mr Rubio was referring.
