Syrian government says southern clashes halted as dead and wounded 'fill hospital'

Sound of gunfire ceases - but smell of corpses spreads through hospital

Residents have reported no sound of gunfire in Sweida city this morning.

Some tribal groups have returned to Damascus and northern areas, a Syrian security source told Reuters.

Kenan Azzam, a dentist, described the situation as "a tense calm" but added 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.

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.

Syrian president has 'huge shortage of manpower' to control factions

Nobody on earth is equipped to prevent sectarian violence in Syria after the Assad regime and a brutal revolution, says a Middle East expert and author.

Syrian President Ahmed al-Sharaa is "doing his best" but has a "huge shortage of manpower" and faces "absolutely massive challenges", Diana Darke told Sky News.

"The reality is they don't have enough manpower" despite having the "will to have a unified Syria".

Sharaa is "extremely popular" in Syria, but he should have clamped down on Bedouin groups raiding Druze trucks on the road to Sweida, she said.

For their part, the Druze are divided into three main factions, Darke explained.

Two of them are keen to work with the Syrian government, but one leader, Hikmat al Hajiri, is against any kind of alignment and is backed by Israel.

"The whole thing has been almost deliberately inflamed by this one group and then, of course, mayhem is unleashed by all these horrific videos circulating online."

At least 67 killed waiting for aid in Gaza, hospital officials say

Moving away from Syria for a moment, there is breaking news from Gaza.

At least 67 people have been killed and over a hundred injured while waiting for aid in Al-Sudaniya in Northern Gaza, according to officials.

At least 87,000 people displaced by conflict

Some 87,000 people have been internally displaced by the conflict, says the UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA).

Displaced families need food, water, shelter and healthcare, it said.

Damage to infrastructure from airstrikes and armed clashes has cut off electricity, water, telecommunications, and internet in most areas, particularly Sweida City.

Local systems are "under increasing strain" and "immediate humanitarian assistance" is required to prevent further deterioration, OCHA said.

The World Health Organization has dispatched emergency medical supplies and the UN is "mobilising to deliver humanitarian assistance".

Aid trucks head for Sweida as Bedouin fighters withdraw

Syria's armed Bedouin clans have announced they've withdrawn from the southern city of Sweida.

The Bedouins' withdrawal brought a cautious calm to the area, with humanitarian convoys reportedly on their way. T

The Syrian Red Crescent said they are sending 32 trucks to Sweida loaded with food, medicine, water, fuel and other aid, after the fighting left the province with power cuts and shortages. 

Syrian state media SANA said that the health ministry is also sending a convoy of trucks.

Chaos, looting and brutality in Sweida

Chaos and looting was witnessed by special correspondent Alex Crawford in Syria yesterday.

Fires were lit as fighters retreated, with smoke billowing over already burned-out cars.

Ambulances sped up and down the roads of Sweida, which were strewn with bodies, some burned beyond recognition.

Tribal leaders tell fighters to respect 'fragile' ceasefire

Tribal leaders are telling fighters to respect the government's pleas and retreat from Sweida, reports special correspondent Alex Crawford.

Thousands flocked from across Syria to support the Bedouin tribe in Sweida, which was clashing with an Israeli-backed Druze faction that distrusts the central government.

Khalaf al Modhi, head of one group of tribes called United Tribe, was seen telling followers: "We aren't here to fight and kill Druze… we are here to stop that criminal Hajiri [a Druze cleric who leads one Druze faction] who asked Israel to bomb our country."

Israel, which has bombed since the fall of Bashar Assad, says it attacked Syria earlier this week to protect the Druze.

The situation has calmed in the last few hours, but it could go either way, says Crawford.

"I wouldn't describe the ceasefire as anything other than fragile and shaky."

There are tens of thousands of civilians still trapped inside the city centre, says Crawford.

"The city centre has no electricity, no water, the food is scarce, the hospitals are absolutely packed with the dead and injured."

The government has been "struggling to keep hold of the situation".

"There has been absolutely brutal mayhem and total anarchy inside the city."

US 'heavily involved' in region as Rubio calls on government to bring fighters 'to justice'

US secretary of state Marco Rubio has demanded the Syrian government "bring to justice" any guilty parties in the violence, including "those in their own ranks".

Rubio said government security forces must "prevent ISIS and any other violent jihadists from entering the area and carrying out massacres".

The US has remained "heavily involved" over the last three days with Israel, Jordan and authorities in Damascus, he said.

"The rape and slaughter of innocent people which has and is still occuring must end," said Rubio.

"If authorities in Damascus want to preserve any chance of achieving a unified, inclusive and peaceful Syria free of ISIS and of Iranian control they must help end this calamity by using their security forces to prevent ISIS and any other violent jihadists from entering the area and carrying out massacres. 

"And they must hold accountable and bring to justice anyone guilty of atrocities including those in their own ranks.

"Furthermore the fighting between Druze and Bedouin groups inside the perimeter must also stop immediately."

Government troops prevent fighters from entering Sweida City

Special correspondent Alex Crawford is at a checkpoint outside Sweida City, where there is a large Syrian government military presence.

Factional fighters are being prevented from entering the city.

Bulldozers have erected mounds at the entrance to stop vehicles from going through the checkpoint.

Syria believed it had green light from US and Israel to send forces south, sources say

Syria's government misread how Israel would respond to its troops deploying to the country's south this week, encouraged by US messaging that Syria should be governed as a centralised state, according to eight sources familiar with the matter. 

Israel carried out strikes on Syrian troops and on Damascus on Wednesday in an escalation that took the Syrian leadership by surprise, the sources said.

Damascus believed it had a green light from both the US and Israel to dispatch its forces south despite months of Israeli warnings not to do so, the sources told Reuters, which included Syrian political and military officials, two diplomats, and regional security sources.

That understanding was based on public and private comments from US special envoy for Syria Thomas Barrack, as well as on nascent security talks with Israel, the sources said. 

Barrack has called for Syria to be centrally administered as "one country" without autonomous zones.

Damascus sent troops and tanks to Sweida province on Monday to quell fighting between Bedouin tribes and armed factions within the Druze community.

Syrian forces entering the city came under fire from Druze militia, according to Syrian sources.

Subsequent violence attributed to Syrian troops, including field executions and the humiliation of Druze civilians, triggered Israeli strikes on Syrian security forces, the defence ministry in Damascus and the environs of the presidential palace, according to two sources, including a senior Gulf Arab official.

Sweida clashes halted, claims government

Clashes in Syria's city of Sweida have been halted following the deployment of Syrian security forces to enforce a ceasefire, Syria's internal ministry says.

Sectarian violence in the predominantly Druze region had escalated yesterday, with machinegun fire and mortar shelling ringing out after days of bloodshed.

The Syrian Observatory for Human Rights, a British-based monitoring group, said clashes since last week around Sweida had killed at least 940 people.

Mansour Namour, a resident of a village near Sweida city, said mortar shells were still landing near his home on Saturday afternoon, and that at least 22 people had been wounded.

A doctor in Sweida said a local hospital was full of bodies and wounded people from daysno violence.

"All the injuries are from bombs, some people with their chests wounded. There are also injuries to limbs from shrapnel,"

said Omar Obeid, director of the hospital.

-SKY NEWS