Members of Syria’s security and military services have been detained as part of an investigation into sectarian violence in the southern province of Sweida in July that left hundreds of people dead, investigators said Sunday.
The head of a Syrian committee investigating the violence in Sweida held a news conference in the capital, Damascus, to talk about progress made, but did not release a death toll, saying this will come in the final report that is expected by the end of the year.
In mid-July, armed groups affiliated with Druze spiritual leader Sheikh Hikmat al-Hijri clashed with local Bedouin clans, spurring intervention by government forces who effectively sided with the Bedouins. Hundreds of civilians, mostly Druze, were killed, many by government fighters.
Judge Hatem Naasan, head of the investigative committee, said they have listened to people affected by the violence, including “witnesses and victims.”
“We have achieved positive results,” Naasan told reporters in Damascus, adding that members of security services and the military “who were proven to have committed violations based on investigations of the committee and videos posted on social media platforms” have been detained. He did not say how many were held, adding that after they were questioned, they were referred to judicial authorities.
“Videos posted on social media clearly showed faces and they were detained by the authorities concerned,” Naasan said. He said security members were detained by the Interior Ministry while members of the military are being held by the Defense Ministry.
A Kurdish Syrian woman carries an image of a Druze elder Sheikh Merhej Shahin as a man in military attire, forcibly shaved off his moustache, during a march in support of the people of Sweida in the eastern city of Qamishli on July 17, 2025. (Delil Souleiman/AFP)
Videos surfaced online showing armed men killing Druze civilians kneeling in public squares and shaving the mustaches off elderly men in an act of humiliation.
The Syrian Observatory for Human Rights, a UK-based war monitor, claimed that the violence over the summer killed more than 2,000 people, including 789 Druze civilians “summarily executed by defense and interior ministry personnel.”
Naasan downplayed suggestions that foreign fighters took part in the violence in Sweida. He said that some foreign fighters were detained and questioned, adding they acted on their own by entering the city and none of them were members of the Syrian armed or security forces.
“What became clear to us is that some foreign fighters randomly and individually entered the city of Sweida,” Naasan said.
Bodies lie on the ground as Bedouin and tribal fighters drive along a street amid a cloud of smoke in the northern part of the city of Sweida in southern Syria’s Druze majority province on July 19, 2025. (Bakr ALkasem / AFP)
After the acts of violence in July, many in Sweida now want some form of autonomy in a federal system. A smaller group is calling for total partition.
Most of the roughly 1 million Druze worldwide live in Syria, with the rest in Lebanon and Israel.
Israel bombed government forces during the violence, spurred on by anger from its own Druze population, saying it was acting to defend the minority group as well as enforce its demands for the demilitarization of southern Syria.
Ongoing talks between Israel and Syria to reach some sort of security agreement reportedly hit a snag earlier this year over Jerusalem’s demand that it be allowed to open a “humanitarian corridor” to Sweida.
