Israel has struck the headquarters of the Syrian Ministry of Defence and close to the presidential palace in the capital Damascus, dramatically escalating on another military front in the region, and following through on its threats to intervene over clashes between government troops and Druze fighters in the southern Syrian city of Suwayda.
Syria’s Interior Ministry announced a ceasefire agreement for Suwayda later on Wednesday. Druze religious leader Sheikh Yousef Jarbou confirmed a truce would take effect immediately.
Jarbou said the agreement was “to completely halt all military operations in Suwayda by all parties” and “to fully integrate Suwayda into the Syrian state.”
Footage showed four explosions from Israeli strikes battering the sides of the Syrian military headquarters in Damascus earlier on Wednesday, leading to large plumes of smoke rising in the sky, before another air strike hit close to the presidential palace.
Israel claims it has been carrying out the strikes in Syria to protect Syria’s Druze minority, which Israel views as a potential ally and which has been involved in clashes with Syrian government troops in Suwayda, a Druze stronghold. The community there has not welcomed Israeli intervention in the past.
Syrian state news agency SANA reported that one person was killed, and 28 others were wounded in the strikes, citing the Ministry of Health.
Reporting from Damascus, Al Jazeera’s Zeina Khodr witnessed the attack on the headquarters of the Syrian military, which followed Israeli drone strikes on the complex hours earlier.
“We watched those strikes come in, one after another, in the heart of the Syrian capital,” she said, adding that the sight of Israeli war planes overhead “caused panic”.
“This is a significant escalation,” she said. “This is the Israeli leadership giving a very, very direct message to Syria’s new authorities that they will intensify such strikes … if the government does not withdraw its troops from southern Syria.”
Israeli Defence Minister Israel Katz said in a statement posted on X that the “warnings in Damascus have ended – now painful blows will come”. As Israel’s military announced it was beefing up its forces along the Syrian border, and had carried out strikes on Syrian military convoys moving south, he added that Israel’s military would “continue to operate forcefully in Suwayda to destroy the forces that attacked the Druze until their complete withdrawal”.
Initial ceasefire collapsed quickly
The strikes followed the resumption of fierce fighting in Suwayda, a major centre for the Druze community, after a ceasefire announced by the Syrian government on Tuesday swiftly collapsed.
Syria’s Defence Ministry officials blamed groups “outside the law” for breaking the ceasefire and attacking government troops, who they said were responding to fire while taking measures to protect civilians. The ministry told Al Jazeera it had opened safe corridors in the city for civilians to flee.
Speaking from Damascus, Al Jazeera’s Bin Javaid said at least 70 people were believed to have been killed in the fighting so far. Medical sources in the city say more than 200 people have been injured in the violence.
Meanwhile, the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights, a war monitor based in the United Kingdom, says more than 250 people had been killed as of Wednesday morning, including four children, five women and 138 soldiers and security forces. The observatory added that at least 21 people were killed in “field executions”.
One woman, 20-year-old Evelyn Azzam, told the Associated Press news agency from her home in Jaramana, near Damascus, that she feared her husband had been killed by security forces in Suwayda.
She had been speaking to her husband, Robert Kiwan, on the phone when he was questioned by security forces about whether he was affiliated with Druze militias, when her husband was shot in the hip, she said. She had had no update on his condition since he was taken to hospital.
Chaos at the border
The bloodshed has led to chaotic scenes along the border separating the Israeli-occupied Golan Heights from Syria. Large numbers of Israeli Druze gathered there, with some crossing into Syria to support Druze groups there, while hundreds gathered on the other side of the fence, calling on Israel and the international community to intervene and stop the violence.
Source: Aljazeera
