Residents reported calm in Syria's Sweida on Sunday after the Islamist-led government declared that Bedouin fighters had withdrawn from the predominantly Druze city and the United States stepped up calls for an end to days of fighting.
With hundreds of people reported killed, the Sweida bloodshed has marked a major test for interim President Ahmed al-Sharaa, prompting Israel to carry out airstrikes last week as it declared support for the Druze. Fighting continued on Saturday despite a ceasefire call.
On Sunday morning, residents reported no sound of gunfire in the city after the interior ministry announced late on Saturday that Bedouin tribal fighters had left.
Reuters images showed interior ministry security forces deployed in an area near the city, blocking the road in front of members of tribes congregated there.
Kenan Azzam, a dentist, described the situation on Sunday morning as "a tense calm" but told Reuters residents were still struggling with a lack of water and electricity.
"The hospitals are a disaster and out of service, and there are still so many dead and wounded," he said by phone.
Another Sweida resident, Raed Khazaal, said humanitarian aid was urgently needed in the city. "Houses are destroyed ... The smell of corpses is spread throughout the national hospital", he said in a voice message to Reuters from inside Sweida.
Tom Barrack, the U.S. envoy for Syria, said "brutal acts by warring factions on the ground undermine the government’s authority and disrupt any semblance of order".
"All factions must immediately lay down their arms, cease hostilities, and abandon cycles of tribal vengeance. Syria stands at a critical juncture—peace and dialogue must prevail—and prevail now," he wrote on X.
The Druze are a small but influential minority group present in Syria, Israel and Lebanon who follow a religion that is an offshoot of a branch of Shi'ite Islam. Some hardline Sunnis deem their beliefs heretical.
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The fighting began a week ago with clashes between Bedouin and Druze fighters. Damascus then sent troops to quell the fighting, but they were drawn into the violence and accused of carrying out widespread violations against the Druze.
Residents of the predominantly Druze city have described friends and neighbours being shot at close range in their homes or in the streets by Syrian troops, identified by their fatigues and the insignia on them.
Sharaa, in a speech on Thursday, promised to protect the rights of Druze, accountability for violations, and also vowed to hold to account those who committed violations against "our Druze people". He has blamed the violence on "outlaw groups".
Israel bombed Syrian government forces in Sweida and also hit the defense ministry in Damascus last week.
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said on Thursday Israel had established a policy demanding the demilitarisation of a swathe of territory near the border, stretching from the Israeli-occupied Golan Heights to the Druze Mountain, east of Sweida. He reiterated Israel's policy to protect the Druze.
The United States however said it did not support the Israeli strikes. On Friday, an Israeli official said that Israel agreed to allow Syrian forces limited access to the Sweida area for two days.
A Syrian security source told Reuters that internal security forces had taken up positions near Sweida, establishing checkpoints in both the western and eastern parts of the province where retreating tribal fighters had gathered.
The source said some tribal groups had already returned to Damascus and northern areas.
The Syrian Observatory for Human Rights, a British-based monitoring group, has said clashes since last week around Sweida had killed at least 940 people. Reuters could not independently verify the toll.
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