It took years for Druze spiritual leader Sheikh Hikmat al-Hijri to move from outward support for the Assad regime to cautious criticism and finally open opposition. With the new authorities in Damascus, he is taking an adversarial stance from the start.
Factions in Syria’s southern Suwayda province are split on whether to merge with Damascus. One side—aligned with Druze spiritual leader Sheikh Hikmat al-Hijri—is opposed, while the other—including the powerful Men of Dignity—calls for opening to Damascus and joining its institutions.
Weapons have spread across Suwayda, many in the hands of civilians who took them from the former regime’s military and security sites when the army fled the Druze-majority southern province one day before Assad fell.
With Assad gone, Suwayda’s protest movement endures, turning a watchful eye towards the new government in Damascus and planning for the future.
The assassination of Murhij al-Jarmani, the commander of a local faction in Suwayda and a strong supporter of the ongoing protests, could be a turning point for the Druze-majority province’s nearly year-long uprising. The Assad regime is accused of orchestrating the killing.
Suwayda’s protest movement—marked by a prominent role for women and an insistence on nonviolence—is holding strong nearly 10 months in, despite Damascus deploying military reinforcements and appointing a man accused of war crimes as governor of the southern province.
In Syria’s southern Suwayda province, suspected Jordanian airstrikes hunt drug traffickers and kill civilians. Regime-linked gangs operate with impunity and smugglers ferry drugs over the border. Local armed groups fight back. How did we get here?
In Suwayda, some view tensions between the Men of Dignity and Laith al-Balous—the son of the Druze faction’s assassinated founder—as part of an attempt by the son to lead in his father’s footsteps.
Suwayda’s Men of Dignity faction is at the heart of recent operations against regime-linked “gangs” in the province. What does the group want? And where does it stand vis-a-vis Damascus today?
Following the ousting of the military security-linked Falhout group in Suwayda province last week, operations against other Damascus-linked militias are cautiously moving forward.
