File Photo: The Druze make up around 3 percent of Syria's population. AFP
Some of the protesters waved Israeli flags to thank Israel for intervening on their side during heavy clashes in mid-July between Druze militias and armed tribal groups and government forces.
Saturday’s demonstration comes as Syria grapples with deep ethnic and religious divisions following the collapse of the Assad family rule last December.
The transition has proven fragile, with renewed violence erupting in March along the coast and in July in Sweida, a city with a significant Druze population, highlighting the continued threat to peace after years of civil war.
The Britain-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights, a Syrian war monitor, said the protesters expressed their rejection of the interim central government in Damascus and demanded that those responsible for atrocities against Druze be brought to justice.
The Observatory said some of the protesters called on Israel to intervene to support their demand for self-determination.
Rayyan Maarouf, who heads the activist media collective Suwayda 24, said Saturday’s demonstration in Sweida was the largest since last month’s clashes, and that there were similar gatherings in areas including the nearby towns of Shahba and Salkhad.
He added that this is the first time people protested under the slogan of self-determination.
“This is an unprecedented change for the Druze in Syria,” Maarouf told The Associated Press.
Clashes erupted on 13 July between Druze militias and local Sunni Muslim Bedouin tribes in Sweida, southern Syria. Government forces intervened, ostensibly to restore order, but in practice sided with the Bedouins against the Druze. The violence left hundreds dead and was marked by atrocities.
Israel then intervened, claiming to defend the Druze minority. It launched dozens of airstrikes targeting convoys of government fighters and even struck the Syrian Defence Ministry headquarters in central Damascus.
Israel, which has its own Druze community—including in the Golan Heights—has presented itself as a protector of the sect. However, some analysts argue this may be a pretext for pursuing a strategic aim: keeping Syrian government forces as far from the Israeli-occupied Golan Heights as possible.
The Druze religious sect originated as a 10th-century offshoot of Ismailism, a branch of Shia Islam. Over half of the roughly one million Druze worldwide live in Syria, with most others in Lebanon and Israel—including the Golan Heights, which Israel captured from Syria during the 1967 Middle East war and annexed in 1981.
Israel’s annexation remains unrecognised by the international community, despite the US announcing recognition in 2019.
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