Israel has carried out overnight attacks on the Syrian military in the Suwayda Governorate, claiming to have hit a military headquarters as well as multiple army camps and weapons storage in the area in what they presented as retaliation for violence against the region’s Druze minority.
Defense Minister Israel Katz accused the Syrian government of exploiting the ongoing Israeli war against Iran and Lebanon as an opportunity to attack the Druze, and said Israel would not allow this, threatening further attacks with greater force.
Interestingly, relatively little is confirmed about the putative attack on the Druze in the first place this time. Clashes were reported in Suwayda and Druze groups claimed nine Druze were killed. The fighting doesn’t appear to have been entirely involving the Syrian military, however the Druze claimed a government-run checkpoint had detained a number of Druze civilians while this was ongoing.
Fighting picks up again in Suwayda Governorate | Image from Syrian Observatory for Human Rights
The Syrian Observatory for Human Rights reported Thursday fighting near Barad village in Suwayda, and that did involve government forces and their auxiliaries attacking a checkpoint under the control of one of the Druze factions. They only confirmed two Druze fighters killed, though Druze groups later claimed a higher toll.
Violence against the Druze minority in Suwayda reached a peak in July of 2025, when fighting between Druze and Bedouin tribal factions escalated and government forces joined in on the Bedouin side, leaving some 1,448 confirmed killed in the clashes and the subsequent summary executions of Druze.
Suwayda has remained more or less cut off from the rest of Syria since then, with Druze factions setting up militias to defend their local communities and the Syrian military trying to keep the situation more or less tamped down. Tensions are high though, and as yesterday showed it takes very little for this to erupt in more fighting, and a subsequent Israeli pretext to further intervene militarily.
Rockets were fired at central Israel on Friday morning, though apparently by a faction wholly unrelated to the ongoing Suwayda violence.
