Clashes in Syria: Who are the Druzes, minority of the Middle East?

“The Druzes are a supra-tribal community that transcends space and geography,” explains Makram Rabah, assistant professor of history at the American University of Beirut. The more than a million Druzes in the Middle East “played a very important role” in the region, adds Mr. Rabah, adding that they are part of “founding communities” in Lebanon and Syria. Here is an overview of this community that clashes have opposed Bedouins in recent days in southern Syria.

Druze thought appeared in Egypt at the beginning of the 11th century as a sect within Shiism. It remains perceived as an esoteric current by dominant Islam. Surrounded by a form of secret, it incorporates mystical elements such as belief in reincarnation in man. “We do not know that they are Druzes as long as they do not say,” according to Makram Rabah.

The community does not accept new converts and discourages marriages outside the community. Druzes religious festivals coincide with the Muslim calendar. The traditional Druze outfit is black. Men wear white cups or turbans, and women cover their heads and part of the face with a long white veil.

“Where borders have been traced, the Druzes did not really recognize them,” said Rabah, in particular because we are gladly married between Druzes in the whole region. “Religious play a very important role in maintaining these links,” he said. Before the start of the civil war in 2011, Syria had, according to estimates, around 700,000 Druzes, speaking Arabic, the language common to the whole country which houses a mosaic of communities.

According to the academic, poet and calligrapher Sami Makarem (1931-2012), the Druzes began to migrate south of Syria in the 16th century, in a region today called Jabal Al-Druze, in the province of Soueida. The Syrian Druzes are mainly concentrated in this bastion of Soueida, the neighboring province of Qouneitra and the suburbs of Damascus, notably in Jaramana and Sahnaya, affected in the spring by denominational violence.

In Lebanon, some 200,000 Druzes live mainly in the country’s mountain center and the South, near the Israeli and Syrian borders, according to estimates. In Israel, around 153,000 Druzes are Israeli citizens after the creation of the Hebrew state, which is mainly living in the North. Unlike the other Arabs in Palestine who became Israeli, the Druze is subject to compulsory enrollment in the army.

On the Syrian Golan Plateau, annexed by Israel, more than 22,000 Druzes now have permanent resident status. Only 1,600 agreed to take Israeli nationality, the others remaining attached to their Syrian identity. The annexation of the Golan by Israel separated from families, although the Golan Druze annexed have often been able to go to Syria to study or attend weddings.

Some Druzes in southern Syria have also settled in neighboring Jordan, where the community is estimated between 15,000 and 20,000 people. Outside the Middle East, the Druze diaspora swarmed in North America, Latin America and Australia.

Druzes leaders are a ferment of nationalism in the Middle East since the Ottoman Empire. In Syria, the Druze Sultan Pasha Al-Trache, at the head of an insurrection in 1925-27, was a precursor of the independence of Syria against France, finally obtained in 1946. In Lebanon, the leader Druze Kamal Joumblatt had a key role from the 1950s until his assassination in 1977 sponsored by Syria during the civil war.

Since the fall of President Bashar al-Assad in December, Israel has multiplied the opening gestures towards the Druze in Syria, a solidarity variously appreciated in the community. Walid Joumblatt, 76, who took over his father, urged the Druzes of Syria to reject “Israeli interference” and the Druze leaders of Syria reaffirmed their loyalty to united Syria, some, however, calling for international protection after the violence of spring. In Israel, the spiritual leader Druze, Cheikh Mowafaq Tariff, called on the Hebrew State to protect the Druze of Syria.