The death toll from this week's outbreak of sectarian violence in Syria has exceeded 100, war watchdog groups said Thursday after anxiety spread across new regions.
Violence broke out in Jaramana city on Tuesday after an audio clip circulated on social media claiming to be an interfering minority clergy who scorned Prophet Muhammad. The clergy denied the charges and said Syrian Interior Ministry had said that the initial findings showed that he was not a person in Clip.
Nevertheless, armed Sunni Muslim extremist groups began attacking areas including Jaramana, which has a large hay group on the outskirts of the capital Damascus. Druse Militias responded effectively to protect the neighborhood, and the government sent its own troops to quell the unrest.
On Wednesday, the clash spread to Ashurafie Sanaya, another town on the southern outskirts of the capital. Earlier on Thursday, violence spilled from the outskirts of Damascus to Sweida, an interference control area in southern Syria.
The bloodshed raised fears that countries where religious minorities already feel deeply fragile are already feeling vulnerable, as the overthrow of Assad's dictatorship in December fracture further.
This was the second major outbreak of sectarian violence since the rebel coalition overthrew President Bashar al-Assad and seized power.
The coalition was led by Hayat Taharil al-Sham, a Muslim group once linked to al-Qaeda, and included other Muslim armed groups with more extreme ideologies. Many of these groups are not under the control of the new government, and new Syrian authorities show little ability to hold them back.
The Syrian Human Rights Observatory, a UK-based war monitor, said the death toll from the three-day clash had risen to 101 by Thursday.
For the first time on Thursday, the observation deck reported that extremists killed 35 hay on the road linking Sweeda to Damascus and five drying fighters in a village in the Sweeda area.
Those killed in Ashrafie Sanaya on Wednesday included Hassan Wawar and his son, former mayor, the observation deck said.
The observatory said 20 people from government security forces were killed in anxiety this week, and 10 people were killed by the alliance group.
Druse, a religion that is a derivative of Islam, has a well-organized militia based in Sweida, reluctant to integrate into the new government's military.
Israel, which has close ties with Israeli Druse, also joined the fight on Wednesday, launching airstrikes against what it characterized as “operators” who attacked Syrian interfering civilians.
Syria's new Muslim leaders are struggling to absorb the complex web of armed groups operating across the country into the national military. In addition to Druse Militias, there are armed facts supporting the government, whom Druse activists and extremists interviewed this week, said they appear to be involved in the clash with Druse.
Sweida hay militia commander Abu Hassan, who had travelled by the prestigious Gerer, said thousands of fighters fought in several locations between Sweida and another southwestern city of Dara on Wednesday. He said Druss militants are fighting Bedouin militants, particularly those allied with the government.
The governors of the region, including Jaramana and Ashrafieh Sahanaya Amr Al-Sheikh, denounced the “banned groups” for launching the first violence at a press conference on Wednesday, but did not identify the group. Al Sheikh refused to acknowledge the existence of the government armed faction, saying that government forces deployed to protect the two towns.
However, other security authorities personally acknowledge that the government cannot control all the armed groups it supports.
“We have the right to maintain our weapons to protect ourselves from these random factions,” said Lubuna Bass, a Hay activist in Sweida, who said the attacks continued Thursday in rural villages in Sweida, including Al Sawara.
The government “argued that they are sending all these military reinforcements to protect us, but we don't trust them,” she added.
Despite the sectarian battles, the government's general security forces include the fighters of Druse and other minorities, as well as the majority of the Sunni Muslims in the country. Druse was among the general security forces killed this week.
But despite the government's promise of inclusiveness, Syrian minorities have deepened anxiety after struck the coastal region of Syria, the country's Alawites home, the country's minority group to which the Assad family belongs, and then struck a wave of sect-killing marching.
Reham Mourshed contributed the report.
