Israel Strikes Syria’s Capital, Sending Warning to Government

Israel threatened to escalate attacks on Syrian government forces unless they withdrew from Sweida, a southern province dominated by the country’s Druse minority.

Israel launched deadly airstrikes on Syria’s capital on Wednesday, damaging a compound housing the defense ministry and hitting an area near the presidential palace, according to the Israeli military and Syrian authorities.

The bombardment in central Damascus, the capital, followed days of bloody clashes involving Syrian government forces in the southern region of Sweida, the heartland of the country’s Druse minority.

The Israeli government, which has pledged to protect that minority, warned Wednesday it would intensify strikes if Syrian government forces did not withdraw from the region, a strategically important province near Israel and Jordan. Israeli officials have said previously that they want to prevent any hostile forces in Syria from entrenching near their borders.

The escalating tensions between Israel and the Syrian government threaten to derail their tentative steps toward warmer ties after decades of hostility. Syria’s new president, Ahmed al-Shara — a former Islamist rebel leader — has tried to stabilize the country since overthrowing the dictator Bashar al-Assad in December. He has also forged closer relations with the United States.

Mr. al-Assad was a loyal ally of Iran and a sworn enemy of Israel. But the rebels who ousted him have opened contacts with Israel in recent months, mediated by the United States, in a bid to lower cross-border tensions.

Shortly after the Israeli airstrikes on Damascus, Syrian authorities announced that a new cease-fire had been reached in Sweida with local leaders. Later, Secretary of State Marco Rubio said on social media that the United States had worked with all parties involved in the clashes and had “agreed on specific steps that will bring this troubling and horrifying situation to an end tonight.”

Soon after, the Syrian state news agency, SANA, reported that government forces had begun withdrawing from Sweida under the cease-fire agreement.

The clashes in recent days were Sweida’s deadliest in recent memory. More than 300 people have been killed in four days, according to the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights.

Electricity and internet outages are widespread. Hospitals are facing shortages in medical supplies. Many civilians are unable to flee and sheltering at home.

The fighting in Sweida erupted on Sunday after armed members of a Bedouin tribe attacked and robbed a Druse man along a main highway, the Observatory said. As the unrest escalated, Mr. al-Shara’s government deployed its military forces to the province on Monday to quell the conflict, Syrian officials said.

But given deep-seated mistrust of the new government, some members of Druse militias in Sweida thought that the government forces were coming to aid the Bedouins and to attack the Druse, according to Druse militia leaders.

The latest flare-up of unrest in Syria underscored the deep challenges Damascus faces in trying to reassert authority across a country still fractured by a complex web of armed groups left over from the nearly 14-year civil war.

Despite assurances from Syria’s new leadership, many of the country’s religious and ethnic minorities remain skeptical of Mr. al-Shara, who once led a rebel group that pledged fealty to Al Qaeda.

The Israeli airstrikes in the capital on Wednesday caused “extensive” damage in the heart of Damascus, according to the Observatory, sending thick plumes of smoke rising above the skyline. At least one civilian was killed and 18 were injured, according to Syria’s health ministry.

Syrians described scenes of chaos as Israeli fighter jets pierced the capital’s sky, raining down missiles as workers sat at their desks or commuted.

“We were inside the ministry when the first airstrike hit,” said Abu Musab, 30, an employee at the defense ministry. “Then a second strike followed. Later, the aircraft came back and carried out four strikes in a row,” he added.

“There are still people trapped under the rubble,” he said.

The Israeli military attacked the Syrian military’s general staff compound where it said Syrian commanders were directing government forces in Sweida. The defense ministry is housed in the same complex.

Israeli strikes also targeted an area near the presidential palace in Damascus, the president’s seat of power, the military said.

An Israeli military official told reporters that Israel was conducting dozens of airstrikes against Syrian forces in Sweida — including targeting Syrian soldiers. The official, who spoke on condition of anonymity to comply with military protocol, said Israel was acting to prevent a buildup of hostile forces near its borders, as well as to prevent attacks on Druse civilians.

Many Druse leaders in Syria have said they do not want Israel to intervene on their behalf, opposing the notion of foreign intervention.

One notable exception is Hikmat al-Hijri, a Druse cleric who appealed on Wednesday for support from President Trump and Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu of Israel. Mr. al-Hijri is a vocal critic of the new leadership in Damascus.

The surging violence in southern Syria also prompted chaos near the boundary separating the country from Israeli-controlled territory as scores of Druse citizens of Israel surged across the border in an attempt to show solidarity with the Syrian Druse.

Mr. Netanyahu warned them in a televised statement that they could be killed or kidnapped in Syria and urged them to return to Israeli territory.

“We are acting to save our Druse brothers and to eliminate the gangs of the regime,” he said. “And now I have a single request of you: You are Israeli citizens. Do not cross the border. You are risking your lives,” he added.

The new cease-fire agreement reached on Wednesday, which Syria’s interior ministry said had been brokered with local leaders in Sweida, called for an “immediate and comprehensive cessation of all military operations,” the re-establishment of state authority in the area and the integration of the region into the Syrian state.

One of the biggest challenges for Mr. al-Shara’s new government has been controlling waves of sectarian violence that could easily spiral into a wider civil conflict again. These clashes were the third major surge of violence involving Syrian minorities since the Assad regime collapsed.

In March, armed groups who had served in Mr. al-Assad’s security forces ambushed the new government’s forces on the Syrian coast, setting of days of sectarian violence that killed more than 1,600 people, mostly from the minority Alawite sect, according to the Observatory.

In May, more than 39 people, mostly from the Druse minority, were killed over two days in a wave of violence near Damascus.

Gabby Sobelman, Reham Mourshed, Lara Jakes and Muhammad Haj Kadour contributed reporting.

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