Violent clashes between pro-government fighters and Druse militia around Syria’s capital, Damascus, spread on Wednesday and drew Israel’s military into the fray, leaving at least 11 people dead, according to the Syrian authorities and a war monitor.
The total death toll for two days of unrest rose to at least 28 after the latest outbreak of gun battles.
The Israeli military said it had carried out a warning attack on the outskirts of Damascus against what it called “extremists” said to be preparing to attack members of the Druse religious minority, according to a joint statement by the Israeli prime minister’s office and the defense minister.
Israel’s government has close relations with the Druse community in Israel and has offered to protect the Druse in Syria should they come under attack amid a tumultuous transition of power. The Syrian authorities made no immediate comment on the Israeli attack.
The latest fighting spread overnight from Tuesday to Wednesday to the town of Ashrafieh Sahnaya, a largely Druse town just south of Damascus, when armed gunmen attacked checkpoints and vehicles belonging to government forces, according to the Syrian state news agency, SANA.
That followed clashes a day earlier in Jaramana, another town on the southern outskirts of Damascus that is also home to a large number of Druse.
The violence in Ashrafieh Sahnaya on Wednesday saw local Druse militia battle with pro-government fighters, according to the war monitor, the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights, which is based in Britain.
A Syrian Interior Ministry official called the gunmen who attacked government forces on Wednesday “criminals” and said that the government would “strike with an iron fist,” according to SANA.
The fighting this week erupted after an audio clip circulated on social media purporting to be of a Druse cleric insulting the Prophet Muhammad. The cleric denied the accusation, and Syria’s Interior Ministry said that its initial findings showed that he was not the person in the clip.
Nonetheless, appeals for calm by the Syrian government did little to stem the anger, with protests breaking out in a number of cities. Many of the demonstrations took on a sectarian tone with some protesters calling for violence against the Druse, according to the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights.
Syria is a predominantly Sunni Muslim nation, while the Druse are a religious group that practices a deliberately mysterious offshoot of Islam. The rebels who led the overthrow of the former dictator Bashar al-Assad belonged to a Sunni Islamist group that was once linked to Al Qaeda. They now run the government and the national military.
Many Syrian Druse have rejected any offer by Israel to come to their defense. Some Druse did cross the border last month on a religious pilgrimage to Israel for the first time in years.
Since Mr. al-Assad was ousted, Israel has carried out numerous incursions in Syria, raiding villages, launching hundreds of airstrikes and destroying military outposts. Israel says that it wants to prevent weapons from falling into the hands of hostile groups and that it does not want enemy forces to entrench in areas near its borders.
Syria’s new leaders have wrestled to integrate the complex web of armed groups operating across the country into the new state apparatus. Several of the strongest Druse militias are in talks with the government about their conditions for integrating into the army.
After the violence in Jaramana, Syrian officials met on Tuesday with Druse religious figures and local community leaders in a bid to restore calm. They agreed to hold those involved in the attack accountable, according to SANA.
Jaramana was mostly quiet on Wednesday, but some residents had fled the chaos, according to the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights.
Sectarian violence has hit Syria several times since the ouster of Mr. Assad, stoking fears among many minority groups that the country’s new leaders will marginalize or even target them.
Last month, a wave of sectarian violence erupted in Syria’s coastal region, home of the country’s Alawites, the minority group that the Assad family belongs to. The violence began with Assad loyalists launching a coordinated attack on the new government’s forces in the area.
Thousands of pro-government fighters then stormed the coastal region and killed more than 1,600 civilians, mostly Alawites, within a few days, according to the human rights observatory.
Aaron Boxerman contributed reporting from Jerusalem.