My father was born in southern Syria in 1948. After the war of that same year, my grandfather went to Israel. He hoped to find work and a better future. He believed that the Jewish people, who had just founded a new nation, could offer them hope, and they were right. In 1953, my grandmother, my father and my uncle joined him. From that moment, our destiny, our present and our future have intimately linked to the history of Israel.
The deep historical and biblical ties between the Jewish and Druze communities, as well as the faithful alliance between the Druze people and the State of Israel, led the latter to make a courageous and perilous decision: defending the Druze community in Syria. However, Israel has never been intended to protect all the minorities in the Middle East alone. This role should return to the international community. But while the Western powers and the moderate Muslim nations are hidden from their duty to protect vulnerable groups such as the Alawites, the Christians, the Kurds, the Druze, and others, in the face of the rising brutality of the jihadists, Israel has chosen to act.
While Western powers are reluctant to protect vulnerable groups from the Middle East, Israel has chosen to act
In recent days, jihadist groups have launched an attack of incredible violence against the heart of the Druze region: A’Suwayda, its main city and the villages that surround it. This is the third offensive since the rebel group HTS and the Syrian president Al-Julani took control of a large part of Syria. But this time, things are different. Fueled by disinformation and fueled by hatred, Bedouin tribes and jihadist factions have united with a dreadful purpose: to make disappear what they call “the Druze problem” in A’SUWAYDA.
The forces of the Syrian regime, far from defending their citizens, made themselves accomplices of the atrocities committed by Islamist terrorists: they killed, raped and removed from Druzes men, women and children. Our spiritual leaders were targeted to humiliate them: their mustaches, considered for generations as sacred symbols of wisdom and faith, were razed by force before they were imprisoned or executed.
While I write these lines, the disinformation campaign continues to rage. Its objective is double: ignite public opinion in the Sunni world and put the conscience of Western liberals. It is not an abstract strategy, it unfolds before our eyes, especially in France, where silence has become a form of complicity.
France has long been a lighthouse of freedom and human rights
We, Druze people, launch an urgent appeal to the United Nations and the international community to rise against terrorism and take concrete measures to protect vulnerable minorities in Syria. Today, I directly speak to President Emmanuel Macron and the French government: take a stand and protect the Druzes communities in the Middle East.
Our stories are intertwined. France has long been held as a lighthouse of freedom and human rights, and President Macron was one of the first Western leaders to reach out to Al-Julani, a gesture that engages immense responsibility. France now has a moral and historical obligation: that of getting up to defend the Druzes, which face an existential danger in the Levant.
In the middle of the 19th century, France intervened in Lebanon and Syria to protect Christian communities. This made it possible to reshape the region in the name of a mission both logical and necessary. At the beginning of the 20th century, the Druzes began a dialogue with the French mandate, in search of recognition and rights. When negotiations failed, we got up. The revolt has not triumphed militarily, but it sowed the seeds that led to the birth of modern Syria.
French generals and diplomats have learned to respect the Druzes for their courage, their convictions and the accuracy of their cause
French generals and diplomats have learned to respect the Druzes for their courage, their convictions and the accuracy of their cause. This inheritance of mutual recognition and common struggle still exists. Today, we ask the French people and their government to honor this memory and to exercise their influence and their means again, this time to put an end to the terror that falls on us.
France also knows the scars left by jihadist terrorists. From the heavy silence of the massacre to the Bataclan to the violence which struck Charlie Hebdofrom Paris to Toulouse, to Nice, the echoes of these dramas still resonate in the soul of the nation. These injuries remain open, not only as memories of mourning, but as warnings in the face of what barbarism left unanswered.
If Sweida falls, the consequences will not be limited to the borders of Syria.
If Sweida falls, it will mark a new advance in fanaticism.
If Sweida falls, this shock wave will cross the borders.
The jihadists will not stop at the Druzes. All minorities in the region are threatened. It is not a simple warning. I’m talking about a reality, which takes place here and now.
Act. Before silence became a form of complicity.
* Fares Saeb is Minister Plenipotentiary at the Embassy of Israel in India and member of the Druze community.
