'I dream of a liberated Druze land': One activist's national aspirations - interview

Druze activist Khalifa Khalifa dreams of a friendly Druze autonomy in southern Syria as a response to the Assad regime’s deadly campaign.

By OHAD MERLIN

JULY 19, 2024 
JERUSALEM POST

"THE DRUZE saw themselves as part and parcel of the Syrian state, until the war began.' A Druze girl takes part in a rally over then-US president Donald Trump's support for Israeli soverignty over the Golan Heights, in Majdal Shams near the ceasefire line between Israel and Syria

.(photo credit: AMMAR AWAD/REUTERS)

First I just want to thank you very much,” opened Khalifa Khalifa. “In the shadow of the events in Gaza and the war with Hezbollah, it is difficult to draw attention to something that is far from the eye and far from the heart, and no one seems to care, so this has great meaning for me.”

Khalifa defines himself as “an Israeli Druze who worries and cares for my Druze brothers in Syria.” He is a researcher of the Middle East, an activist raising awareness for the situation of the Druze in Syria, and the owner of a podcast named The Rebellion of the Caliphs. “When I started my podcast, I never thought there would be a real rebellion going on in Syria,” he added thoughtfully.

Khalifa referred to the ongoing events in Jabal Al-Druze, or Druze Mountain, a predominantly Druze region in the Suwayda governorate of southern Syria, where the local Druze population, numbering several hundreds of thousands, is sounding its voice ever so loudly against the Bashar Assad regime.


Khalifa explained that, during the civil war in Syria, which has been taking place for the last decade, the regime has been targeting the Druze population in the area, allegedly for its refusal to take part in the war.

“The Druze of Syria voted with their feet not to take part in what is happening Syria, and they saw it as foreign intervention in the state’s affairs,” explained Khalifa, referring to the involvement of Hezbollah and Iran.

DURING THE civil war in Syria, which has been taking place for the last decade, the Assad regime has been targeting the Druze population, allegedly for its refusal to take part in the war. (credit: AMMAR AWAD/REUTERS)

“The Syrian regime did not like this,” the Druze activist continued. “The Druze are only about 3%-4% of the general population in Syria. They saw themselves as part and parcel of the Syrian state, until the war began. They were very integrated: officers in the army, in intelligence, in all aspects of life. Most of them are farmers who just want to live in peace.

“But then the war started, and they refused to take part. The regime began applying all kinds of terror tactics against the Druze population. They assassinated Druze leaders who came out against the war, such as Waheed Bal’ous in 2015. The Druze saw this war as an immoral factor, certainly with the Iranian occupation and the intervention of Hezbollah.”

Khalifa added that since the Druze live in such a wide area and the regime was busy fighting its own wars, Assad resorted to a tactic of de facto ethnic cleansing. “This involved economic strangulation, land dispossession. The regime just sits on the main arteries of life, puts up barriers at the entrance and exit of the villages, kidnaps people indiscriminately. Druze who made their way from Suwayda to Damascus found themselves in interrogation cellars and underwent torture.”

According to Khalifa, tens of thousands have fled the Suwayda region because life has become too difficult in the Druze homeland. “They are also getting poorer. The richest ones there, with high socioeconomic status, make $400-$450 a month.”

Khalifa elaborated that in early August last year, the Druze started to organize recurring nonviolent demonstrations, openly calling for the removal of Assad, an end to the war, and the establishment of a new Syria. This explicit call to oust a political leader is a rare occurrence for the ethno-religious group, known for its almost religious-like allegiance to the local political leadership regardless of where they are.

“Unfortunately, the world does not pay attention to this. Everyone is understandably drowning in the October 7 events, but there is a very extreme escalation of the violence applied against the Druze demonstrators by the Assad regime. In the last month, Assad’s army has been sending agents with the aim of sowing chaos and stirring war. The Druze just demonstrate and chant, not threatening anyone, but Assad’s men come and shoot them from behind to try and sow terror and fear.”

ISRAEL HAS the world’s third-largest Druze population, after Syria and Lebanon. Here, Druze gather to contact their relatives on the Syrian side of the border from the Israeli Golan Heights. (credit: AMMAR AWAD/REUTERS)

Help from unexpected friends

Not much coverage has been given to what Khalifa regards as “the Syrian Druze version of October 7, just a few years ago.

“On July 25, 2018, a group of ISIS radicals infiltrated some of the Druze villages in Suwayda, committing horrors and atrocities very much like those of October 7,” he said. “Watching the Hamas massacre after knowing what ensued in Suwayda was absolutely shocking. They [ISIS] infiltrated homes, kidnapped, murdered. There was a horrific video circulating of the beheading of a 17-year-old Druze girl.”

Other acts committed by the Islamic State terrorists included suicide bombings and the kidnapping of women and children, with casualties reaching over 200, according to some sources, most of them innocent civilians.

Khalifa holds that these horrific attacks happened with the silent blessing of the Assad regime, as another form of retaliation against what it viewed as “disloyal” Druze population. “Assad allowed them a safe passage to Jabal Al-Druze and allowed them to ‘slaughter the infidels.’ We’re sure of that.”

“The Druze are strong fighters, so they managed to repel the terrorists, but they paid a heavy price. Several young people were kidnapped, and Islamic State demanded a ransom; perhaps that, too, was Assad’s dowry,” Khalifa added.

Then, the Druze in Syria encountered aid from an unexpected direction. “The Druze in Israel stood by their brethren’s side and gathered some money. Our religious leadership was especially involved. For the Syrian Druze this was a significant gesture. There are merely 130,000 Druze in Israel in comparison to hundreds of thousands in Syria. But despite this, we managed to raise money and support them. So, the Druze in Syria felt for the first time the power of Jewish-Druze alliance.”

Khalifa explained that this aid from their Israeli brethren was very significant for the Syrian Druze. “Since then, we see a desire and a longing to meet the Israeli Druze. Perhaps it’s parallel to the way Jews in Israel look at Jews abroad, as both long lost family and benefactors who donate and help.”
The Druze-Jewish alliance

Khalifa described how these times led him to mull over the question of the essence of the Jewish-Druze alliance.

“For many outside of Israel, the general idea is that the Druze in Israel chose to tie their fate with the State of Israel because they deemed Israel to be strong or for their own interests. Walid Jumblatt, a Lebanese Druze leader, sounded this exact idea in an interview he gave not too long ago.

“But anyone who lives here knows that this description just doesn’t hold water – it just doesn’t grasp the essence of life here!

“We saw it best on October 7, how the Druze sacrificed their lives with their Jewish counterparts to save people’s lives and fight against Hamas in Gaza. If their perception of our alliance was true, we would have never had people like Lt.-Col. Salman Habka, who fell on October 7 after having mobilized his forces to fight the Hamas terrorists in the [Super]nova [music] festival, despite living hundreds of kilometers away.

“I came across a book titled The Idea of ​​the Druze State by Shawki Amran,” continued Khalifa. “It begins by dedicating the book to the Druze community and proceeds to open with a quote from the Jewish traveler Benjamin of Tudela from the 12th century where he tells about a nation called ‘the Druzian’ who live in the mountains and crevices of the rocks, and who are loved by the Jews and cannot be fought with or defeated. I had chills – this goes back a thousand years!”

Khalifa explained that he perceived much positive sentiment toward Israel from his Syrian counterparts, as well as a strong desire to receive recognition and help.

“I told a Druze friend of mine how good it is to live in Israel with Jews and to fight together, and all his responses were very sympathetic to Israel. I told him that some Druze in the Golan are not willing to vote in the Israeli elections, do not want a local council, raise Assad’s flag, and go to demonstrations. He told me: ‘Tell these dishonorable men to come and live here in Suwayda; I would gladly switch places with them.’”
Who can we talk to?

Khalifa described how he was looking for a way to reconcile between Israelis and their neighbors, but October 7 made him change his perspective as for the identity of those neighbors.

“Us Druze, we’re in a constant identity crisis, as if we lived between divorced parents – Israelis and the Palestinians – and we only want them to reconcile and connect,” he added ironically. “But then October 7 occurred, which for me was Holocaust-like. Just like in Nazi Germany, many of the atrocities were committed by those who one might deem ‘ordinary people’: teachers, traders, UNRWA staff, fishermen. As soon as the border was breached, they carried out all of these atrocities. It reminded me of Hanna Arendt’s ‘banality of evil’ [Eichmann in Jerusalem: A Report on the Banality of Evil]. So who can we even speak to?

“It is clear to me that this is not a matter of leaders,” Khalifa continued. The Hamas movement sits on a very deep foundation. Even a year into the suffering in Gaza, there is no anarchy; they still stand behind Hamas. [There were] 100,000-150,000 salary recipients from Hamas – this is half of the population that was educated in the Hamas education system. They sit in mosques, in the media, in schools – this is the Muslim Brotherhood’s method of working.

“So, surely there is nothing to talk about with Gazans right now. That is a lost generation, perhaps two, and their moral compass is so miscalibrated that they still see Hamas as representing ‘moderate Islam.’

“What I wanted to do is reach people whose minds could be changed – not the children of the Hamas summer camps,” he explained.

Khalifa describes that this led him to the realization that he should reach out to the Druze in Syria.

“I started in Gaza but somehow ended up in Suwayda,” he said.
A new alliance

Khalifa started talking to Druze organizations around the world and realized that the Syrian Druze situation is not discussed enough.

“My Syrian Druze friend goes to his workplace with a Kalashnikov because tensions are very high. Just yesterday there were shootings and an escalation by the regime.

“The most immediate connection is the connection between Israel and the Druze in Syria. Sure, not everything is rosy, and it’s not like tomorrow the Druze will raise the Israeli flag, but we do see that for an entire year they haven’t been protesting with any Palestinian flags, and even broke all kinds of Assad family monuments adorned with Palestinian flags.

“So, all of this is pointing in the direction of normalization with Israel. They need very basic things, such as to break the economic blockade imposed on them by the Assad regime.”

Khalifa now mediates meetings between Druze all over the world with the aim of ultimately establishing a global council that will represent Druze aspirations in front of the entire world.

“I’m also part of a ‘normalization center’ currently being established with the help of some friends who think like me and are trying to create alliances between the Jews and other ethnic minorities of the region who are tired of the endless war cycles,” he added.

“We’re trying to reach out to Druze, Maronites, Kurds, Ahwazi Arabs in Iran, Sunnis from the Deraa district in Syria, who have a relatively sympathetic attitude towards Israel, even Bedouin in the Negev who refused to grant refuge to Hamas’s Nukhba militants and handed them over to the police,” Khalifa retold excitedly.

“We should stop seeing the Middle East in one color and realize that we have many potential allies. For many in the moderate Sunni countries, the biggest enemy is not Iran but the extremists at home.”

Khalifa holds on to the aspiration of a Druze autonomy in southern Syria. “The Druze have a flag, they are a nation, with symbols and a culture, and why not also national aspirations?

“I dream that, not many years from now, we will be able to go to hotels in Suwayda and look out over Damascus from a liberated Druze land, managed by its rightful owners.

“If the enemy of my enemy is my friend, in the Druze case, my brother’s brother is a friend,” he concluded.

Khalifa’s channels can be found at: https://youtube.com/@khalifa_shrugged or Khalifashrugged.com