Smoke rises in Latakia, Syria, on March 7 as members of the Syrian forces ride on a vehicle as they battle a nascent insurgency of fighters from ousted leader Bashar al-Assad's Alawite sect. (Karam Al-Masri/Reuters)
Fierce clashes over the past two days between security forces under Syria’s new Islamist government and gunmen belonging to the country’s Alawite religious minority killed dozens of people and threatened to plunge Syria deeper into sectarian violence.
The fighting, centered in Syria’s coastal regions of Latakia and Tartus, marked the most widespread violence since the fall of President Bashar al-Assad’s regime three months ago.
Syrian officials blamed the fighting on supporters of the former regime, saying they ambushed government forces Thursday and killed at least 16 fighters. Assad is a member of the Alawite sect, and drew heavily on members of the community to serve in the ranks of the military.
Col. Hassan Abdul Ghani, a spokesman for the Syrian defense ministry, said that military forces had begun a “wide-scale combing operation” in the coastal city of Jableh and its surroundings, according to Syria’s state news agency SANA. Syria’s coastal regions are heavily populated by Alawites.
The exact death toll remained unclear, but Alawite residents said that they feared widespread revenge killings, sharing videos of dozens of bodies piled up in the streets, and men being executed or made to crawl on the ground and bark like dogs.
“We’ve locked the door, there’s artillery and shooting,” one resident of Jableh said in a phone interview, speaking on the condition of anonymity because he feared for his safety. “Listen, do you hear it?” he said as gunfire cracked in the background.
The resident said he was afraid his house would be stormed, as government officials appeared to concede they were struggling to contain retaliatory attacks. “Large unorganized popular crowds” had headed to the coast and had committed “violations” which the state was attempting to stop, a ministry of interior official told the state news agency.
In the months since Assad’s ouster, Syria’s interim leader,President Ahmed al-Sharaa, has attempted to prevent sectarian bloodletting in a country emerging from 14 years of brutal civil war. But while Damascus has remained relatively stable, sectarian killings have occurred outside the capital. Armed Alawite militias have carried out sporadic attacks on forces affiliated with the new government.
Alawite community leaders framed the unrest Thursday and Friday as the product of unrelenting sectarian violence, including kidnappings of Alawites and mass firings of members of the sect from government jobs. As Alawites faced discrimination for their association with the former regime, some in the community had taken up arms, they said.
“They kidnapped, they killed, they humiliated, they kicked people out of jobs,” said one Alawite community figure, who spoke on the condition of anonymity for security reasons and said his home was shaking from tank fire. “One way or another, this was going to happen.”
Alawites make up roughly 10 percent of Syria’s population, and many live in the mountains of Latakia and Tartus and their coastal plains. While a small circle of Alawites reaped the rewards of Assad’s rule, many continued to live in poverty.
The mass sackings of Alawites from government jobs has left people hungry, the Alawite community leader said.
While several villages remained outside state control Friday morning, the Alawite forces were outgunned, he said. Fighting centered on Beit Ana village, the birthplace of Suhail al-Hassan, a former commander of Syria’s special forces under Assad’s government.
“All these villages are making resistance,” the Alawite community figure said. “But our people only have Kalashnikovs,” he added. “The result of this fight is clear, our people will lose.”
The death toll remains unclear, he said. “There are bodies in the streets, there is no time to bury them.”
In a statement Friday afternoon, Abdul Ghani, the defense ministry spokesman, said government forces had “achieved rapid field progress and reimposed control over the areas that witnessed treacherous attacks against security personnel.”
“We warn again of the dire consequences of continuing treachery, and we confirm that anyone who refuses to hand over his weapon to the state will face a decisive response without leniency,” he added. “Those who bet on chaos have not yet realized that the era of tyranny has ended.”
Residents in the Alawite areas said that some families had gathered around a Russian air base at Hmeimim, in Latakia province, in an attempt to seek protection. Russia, a key backer of Assad’s regime, is negotiating with Syria’s new government the future of its military bases in Syria with the new government.
Asked about the fighting in the coastal area and threat to Russian troops, Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov said that “the necessary security of our servicemen in Syria is provided at the proper level” but declined to comment further.
Turkey, Syria’s neighbor and a key backer of Sharaa’s government, expressed alarm Friday at the spiraling violence.
“At this critical juncture, the tension in and around Latakia, as well as the targeting of security forces could undermine the efforts to lead Syria into the future in unity and solidarity,” Oncu Keceli, a foreign ministry spokesman, wrote in a post on X. “Such provocations must not be allowed to become a threat to peace in Syria and the region,” he wrote.
Natalia Abbakumova in Riga contributed to this report.
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