Druze Religious Leader Denounces Syria

After Israel declared it would protect the Druze from attacks against them in Suweida by the Syrian army and Sunni militias, the IDF not only hit 150 targets — Syrian soldiers and vehicles — inside Suweida, but much more significantly, it bombed both the Syrian military headquarters in Damascus (having warned the Syrians first so they could withdraw people from the targeted building, which is why only three people were killed), and near the Presidential Palace just outside the capital. That display of its power by the IDF was enough to cause Syrian President Ahmed al-Sharaa to reach a ceasefire with the Druze, and to start pulling his forces out of Suweida. The Druze are properly grateful to Israel, but many are convinced that al-Sharaa is not to be trusted. One Druze religious leader, Sheikh Muwafaq Tarif, expressed his deep distrust of al-Sharaa the very next morning after the ceasefire had been declared the night before.

More on Tarif’s views can be found here: “‘We’ve seen this movie with Hamas’: Druze Spiritual leader speaks out after violence in Syria,” Jerusalem Post, July 17, 2025:

Druze leader Sheikh Muwafaq Tarif said on Thursday that Israeli Druze are distrustful of interim Syrian President Ahmed al-Sharaa.

“It was a mistake to lift the sanctions; he hasn’t changed his stripes,” Tarif noted.

The Americans are convinced that al-Sharaa really has abandoned his jihadist past, but the Israelis, and the Druze, are unconvinced. They saw what role his men played in the attacks on the Alawites in Latakia; they have seen his lackadaisical response to the attacks by Sunni militants on Christians in Damascus and Aleppo, including the suicide bombing of the church of Mar Elias, in which 25 parishioners were killed and 63 others wounded on June 22.

Initially, almost a thousand Israelis Druze had gone into Syria to help defend their fellow Druze under attack in Suweida. But the IDF persuaded them to return, as their presence simply complicated the Israeli effort to strike the Syrian Sunni targets without harming the Druze. And they also became the targets of the Syrian army. They did as requested by the IDF; they all came back. And some Syrian Druze, seeking safety, also accompanied them into Israel.

The Druze Sheikh thinks the initial clash between Druze and Bedouins in Suweida was exaggerated by the Syrians, and provided all the excuse Al-Sharaa needed to “bring peace” to the area — the Syrian Druze heartland — by moving in troops, tanks, armored vehicles, and snipers. These troops proceeded to murder Druze fighters and civilians. Tarif also claims that they raped Druze girls, raped Druze nurses and burned them alive, and murdered hundreds of civilians, leaving their bodies in the streets, and wounded a thousand more. He is reporting what his fellow Druze on the ground in Syria have communicated.

Tarif finds fault with Israel for not responding quickly enough when the Syrians moved their tanks into Suweida. But the IDF was preparing as quickly as it could a list of Syrian army targets both inside and on the outskirts of Suweida, as well as other targets, in Damascus itself, that when struck, might make the greatest impression on al-Sharaa. It took Israel only a few hours to respond by launching airstrikes on 160 targets in and near Suweida — troops and tanks and armored vehicles and those key attacks on the military headquarters in Damascus and near to — a way to warn al-Sharaa —on the presidential palace just outside the capital. That does not strike me as “waiting too long.”

Tarif compared the atrocities from Wednesday to the Holocaust.

“I spoke with the army, until there was immense pressure and shocking images and videos started coming out showing what they’re doing. We saw things that the Nazis did with Jewish rabbis, the same thing. To humiliate, certainly. The Sheikh, who is over 80 years old, after they shaved his mustache, they killed him.”…

Druze men are required to have mustaches. Syrian soldiers were videotaped shaving a mustache off an 80-year-old Druze sheikh, and mocking him as they did. Soon after, he dropped dead, and the Druze insist — they may be right — that the humiliating ordeal was a fatal shock to his system.

“Israel did not attack with full force. The tanks, missiles, and mortars, what can a civilian do against them?”

This criticism by Muwafaq Tarif is unfair. Alone among the powers of the earth, the IDF went into action to drive the Syrian army and militias out of Suweida. This required assembling intelligence on likely targets. The IDF drew up a list, subject to last-minute modification should the Syrians be moving men and weapons about in Suweida; it was particularly difficult for the IDF, because it was determined not to endanger any Druze civilians on the ground, so the targets had to be hit with pinpoint accuracy. In addition, the attack on the military headquarters in Damascus had to be undertaken with great caution. The target was in the middle of the capital city, and had the IDF not first warned the Syrians, who quickly removed personnel from the headquarters, there might have been not three, but three hundred dead. Israel wanted to send a message to al-Sharaa, so that he would pull his forces out of Suweida, not start a major war with Syria.

Sheikh Muwafaq Tarif is right to be deeply mistrustful — as is Israel — of al-Sharaa, whose jihadist past is well-known, and who has demonstrated a worrisome indifference to the attacks by Sunnis, on Alawites, Christians, and Druze. If he were to come down hard on the Sunnis, including members of his own army and militias, who have been killing the minorities, one might then be more trusting. So far, he has pledged to punish, but has yet to do so, anyone involved in the attacks on the minorities.

Meanwhile, the Druze, including the spiritual leader Sheikh Muwafaq Tarif, should not be so critical, but should thank Israel for forcing al-Sharaa to agree to a ceasefire and to pulling his troops out of Suweida. Netanyahu has made clear that Israel will now intervene whenever it deems it necessary to protect “our Druze brothers.” Isn’t that worth celebrating, rather than finding fault with Israel for supposedly taking too long to react to the fast-moving situation in Suweida?