Over 500 people people have been killed in southern Syria’s Sweida province, a war monitor said Thursday, giving an updated toll after several days of clashes that triggered the deployment of government forces.
The Syrian Observatory for Human Rights counted 79 Druze fighters and 154 civilians from Sweida among the dead, including 83 people “who were summarily executed by members of the defence and interior ministries.” The clashes also claimed the lives of 243 government personnel and 18 Bedouin fighters, in addition to three members of Bedouin tribes “who were summarily executed by Druze fighters.”
Fifteen government personnel were also killed in Israeli airstrikes.
The southern province has been gripped by deadly sectarian bloodshed since Sunday, with hundreds reportedly killed in clashes pitting Druze fighters against Sunni Bedouin tribes and the army and its allies.
In a televised speech, Islamist interim President Ahmed al-Sharaa said community leaders would resume control over security in Sweida after the deployment of government troops on Tuesday fuelled the sectarian bloodshed and prompted Israeli military intervention.
Government troops told AFP that the order to withdraw came shortly before midnight (2100 GMT on Wednesday) and they completed their pullout from the province at dawn.
An AFP photographer counted 15 bodies on the street in the centre of Sweida on Thursday after government forces pulled out.
Israel had pounded government troops with air strikes during their brief deployment to the southern province and also struck army headquarters in Damascus, warning that its strikes would intensify until the Islamist-led government pulled back.
Sharaa announced in a televised address that “responsibility” for security in Sweida would be returned to community leaders “based on the supreme national interest.”
