Syria’s interim President Ahmed al-Sharaa, also known as Abu Mohammed al-Golani, waits to welcome the senior Ukrainian delegation led by Ukrainian Foreign Minister Andrii Sybiha, after the ousting of Syria’s Bashar al-Assad, in Damascus, Syria, Dec. 30, 2024. Photo: REUTERS/Khalil Ashawi

Israel bombed an area near the presidential palace in Damascus early on Friday in its clearest signal yet of hostility toward the Islamist-led Syrian authorities and a preparedness to ramp up military action in the name of Syria’s Druze minority.

Israel has escalated military operations in Syria since rebels ousted Bashar al-Assad in December, with bombings across the country and ground forces entering its southwest, while calling for Syria to remain decentralized and isolated.

It has framed its stance around its suspicion toward interim President Ahmed al-Sharaa, who once headed a branch of al Qaeda, and the desire to protect the Druze, a minority sect that is an offshoot of Islam with followers in Syria, Lebanon, and Israel.

Early on Friday, Israel‘s military said it struck an area “adjacent” to Sharaa‘s palace in Damascus, without further details. There were no immediate reports of casualties.

The strike was “a clear message to the Syrian regime: We will not allow [Syrian] forces to deploy south of Damascus or any threat to the Druze community,” Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and Defense Minister Israel Katz said in a joint statement.

Syria’s presidency condemned what it described as a “bombardment on the presidential palace” and said it marked a “dangerous escalation.”

“Israel doesn’t want peace. Nor does it care for the groups it purportedly protects by bombing others,” Syrian Foreign Ministry spokesperson Razan Saffour wrote on X, adding Israel had never bombed near the palace when Assad was in power.

This week’s fighting posed the latest challenge for Sharaa, who has repeatedly vowed to unite all of Syria’s armed forces under one structure and govern the country, fractured by 14 years of civil war until Assad’s overthrow, in an inclusive way.

But incidents of sectarian violence, notably the killing of hundreds of pro-Assad Alawites in March, have hardened fears among minority groups about the now-dominant Islamists and sparked condemnation from global powers.

‘DON’T NEED ANYONE’S PROTECTION’

A Syrian official told Reuters the target was about 100 metres (330 feet) east of the palace‘s perimeter.

It followed days of clashes in Syria between Sunni Muslim and Druze gunmen triggered by a voice recording purportedly insulting the Prophet Mohammed. The fighting killed more than two dozen people in towns around Damascus and prompted an initial Israeli “warning strike” on a town on the capital’s outskirts that killed one member of Syria’s security forces.

On Thursday, the clashes began spreading further south to the province of Sweida, which is predominantly Druze.

Late on Thursday, Druze community leaders and Syrian government officials met in Sweida in a bid to defuse tensions. Their concluding statement said residents of Sweida would protect their province as a part of Syria’s internal security forces, and rejected “division, separation, or secession.”

“Syria is our mother nation, we do not have an alternative country,” Sheikh Laith al-Balous, one of the Druze leaders in the meeting, told Syria TV in an interview when asked whether Israel‘s strikes on Syria were meant to protect the Druze. “We don’t need anyone’s protection.”

Syrian security forces on Friday morning were patrolling the village of Al-Soura al-Kubra in Sweida province, where residents had fled clashes the previous day between approaching Sunni Islamist militants and Druze fighters defending the town.

Residents told Reuters that when they returned, they found their homes had been looted. Salman Olaiwi told Reuters his door had been broken down and money was missing but that he was glad an agreement had been reached to end the fighting.

Israel has previously said that it wants to enforce a demilitarised zone in southern Syria, including Sweida province, and would not allow Syrian government forces to deploy there.

Israel has a small Druze community and there are also some 24,000 Druze living in the Golan Heights, which Israel captured from Syria in the 1967 Middle East war. Israel annexed the territory in 1981, a move that has been recognized by the US but not most countries.

Some Druze in Israel serving in the Israeli military wrote to Netanyahu demanding help for their kin in Syria, saying “hundreds of fighters” were ready to volunteer to help.

Netanyahu spoke with the head of the Druze community in Israel and urged them not to take the law into their own hands.