As-Suwayda Between Massacres and Sectarian Incitement: The People’s Battle Against the Authority

In July, As-Suwayda province witnessed horrific massacres and crimes committed by factions of the Termidor authority, operating under names like “General Security” and “the Army,” in addition to militias calling themselves “Fazaa al-Ashair” (Tribal Alert). Nearly a month later, more serious dimensions of these crimes began to unfold as the Red Cross entered the villages that had been occupied by the authority’s gangs.

In recent days, after the withdrawal of the sectarian mercenaries from the villages they had occupied and plundered, the people of the Druze Mountain have begun to tend to their wounds and bury their dead—both the unarmed civilians and the fighters who defended their land and their right to a dignified life. They are holding councils and vigils to mourn and eulogize those who fell at the hands of state-sponsored terrorism.

In contrast, the criminal authority and its followers continue their festivals and celebrations, turning a deaf ear to the people’s cries, immersed in false displays and hollow exhibitions to collect money from the poor people under the pretext of “reconstruction,” after the truth of their illusory contracts and empty investments was exposed. The official justification for these crimes came with flimsy pretexts, such as “avenging the Bedouin victims,” despite the absence of any evidence or testimony of Druze fighters committing systematic killings. Even if there were individual transgressions, they should be addressed within the framework of the law and the state, not through savage attacks with all types of weapons, which often deliberately targeted civilians and their property.

The blood of the martyrs and victims in Jabal al-Arab, and the blood of those deceived and recruited into the ranks of blind sectarianism, as in every inch of Syria, reveals that what happened was not merely a local conflict between Bedouins and Druze, nor a spontaneous sectarian strife. Rather, it is a direct result of the authority’s policy of deliberate incitement and division to ensure the continuation of its hegemony and plunder.

The real battle today is the battle of the entire Syrian people against a corrupt, authoritarian regime that has turned the country into a farm for its own interests. The only possible response is to break this sectarian scheme by uniting ranks on the basis of freedom and social justice, and exposing the illusions of false reconciliations and empty promises.

Confronting this authority is not a political choice, but a matter of existence. Its continuation means the continuation of massacres, poverty, and destruction. The path, no matter how difficult, is the only way to build a new Syria: a Syria of the people, not a Syria of gangs and tyrants.