Thomas Barrack, United States Special Envoy for Syria, announced on Friday that Israel and Syria agreed to a ceasefire seeking to resolve tensions between the two countries. 

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu authorized earlier this week rounds of heavy airstrikes against Syrian government targets and aimed to support Druze rebels, an ethnoreligious minority group, in their fight against Sunni Muslim Bedouin forces. The Bedouins are viewed as being more aligned with Syrian President Ahmed al-Sharaa’s government, although he has vowed to protect the Druze minority.

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Barrack, also the ambassador to Turkey, said the conflict between Israel and Syria would cease due to a U.S.-backed agreement “embraced by Türkiye, Jordan, and its neighbors.”

“We call upon Druze, Bedouins, and Sunnis to put down their weapons and together with other minorities build a new and united Syrian identity, building peace and prosperity with their neighbors,” Barrack added in a post to X. 

The announcement comes after Secretary of State Marco Rubio said on Wednesday that the U.S. had “engaged all the parties involved in the clashes in Syria” and agreed on “specific steps that will bring this troubling and horrifying situation to an end.” The State Department said the following day that the Trump administration “unequivocally condemns the violence” and called on the countries to “step back and engage in meaningful dialogue that leads to a lasting ceasefire.” 

Netanyahu’s military intervention on behalf of the Druze rebels did not have the full support of the White House, as President Donald Trump has sought to stabilize the Middle Eastern region by seeking peace with Damascus, even recently dropping long-standing sanctions against al Sharaa in the hopes of getting him to sign the Abraham Accords, an agreement that would establish diplomatic relations between Israel and Syria. 

Trump has eyed al-Sharaa’s recent ascent to power as an opportunity to make a “fresh start” in restoring stability to the Middle East and sparking warmer relations between the U.S. and Damascus. 

Bashar Assad, Syria’s former president, was ousted in December after being accused of weaponizing brutal chemical attacks against his citizens and inviting U.S. sanctions against the country that were kept in place for years. 

“In Syria, which has seen so much misery and death, there is a new government that will hopefully succeed in stabilizing the country and keeping peace,” Trump said in May during a trip to the Middle East. 

However, tensions between various Syrian military factions have continued to provoke unrest in the country, challenging hopes of peace. 

The recent clashes in the southern Sweida province between the Druze, who form a substantial community in Israel, and Bedouin tribes have invited further military escalation due to Israel’s involvement in defending the rebel forces. Netanyahu has worried that Syrian forces are “massacring” Druze in Sweida, a Druze-majority city.

A local Druze journalist told the Independent that the national hospital in Sweida was packed with bodies, most of them civilians.

“There are more than 500 bodies of those killed in the National Hospital in Sweida, almost all of them civilians. There are women, children, people shot in the head,” he said.

SYRIAN GOVERNMENT FORCES WITHDRAW FROM DRUZE AREAS, ANNOUNCES NEW CEASEFIRE

The Israeli government continues to harbor deep suspicions of al Sharaa, who has accused Netanyahu of seeking to divide the Syrian people and turn the country “into a battlefield of chaos.”

Although his government is known to have backed the Bedouins at times, al Sharaa recently renewed its promises to protect the Druze minority.