Deadly church attacks increase safety fears for Syrians, minorities | Syria’s war news

The deadly attack on Sunday against the Church Mar Elias in Damascus rocked Syria, and in particular the Christians of the country.

The attack on Sunday killed at least 25 people, after a man with a rifle entered the church and shot the faithful, before exploding a suicide bomb. He raised questions about the ability of the new Syrian government to manage security in the country and protect its citizens, including those of minority groups.

The Syrian Ministry of the Interior blamed Isil (Isis) for the attack, although another group called Saraya Ansar Al-Sunna said it later. Government representatives described the attack as an attempt to undermine their efforts to establish a state following the fall of the longtime dictator Bashar al-Assad in December.

“Sedition occurs,” said Hind Kabawat, social minister and Syria’s labor affairs, to Syria TV from a Damascus hospital, when she retaliated. “All Christians and Muslims and all Syrians must be strong today. It’s a big injury, and our pain is tall. ”

Fears in Syria

While the target of the attack was a church – the first of its kind against a Syrian church since the fall of the al -Assad regime – it recalls the precarious security situation in which the country is still found, affecting all Syrians, while the government tries to provide stability.

“It’s very dangerous,” said Abu Hassan, a Damascus resident, in Al Jazeera by phone. He said he was wary of more attacks that take place as part of an attempt to sow the disunity between Christians and Muslims of Syria.

“(The attacks) will not disappear,” he said. “There will be more blood. May God protect this country. “

The end of the al-Assad regime, following a war of more than 13 years in which hundreds of thousands of people died, was welcomed by most Syrians. The Al -Assad dynasty – Bashar had been preceded as president by his father Hafez – had actually built one of the most brutal police states in the world, with a vast network of competing security and intelligence branches which terrorized a large part of the local population.

The man who replaced Bashar al-Assad as president Ahmed Al-Sharaa. His own history – as a former member of Al -Qaeda who have led the Hayat Tahrir Al -Sham, now now, in recent years of war – have led many Syrians to express doubts and concerns concerning his reign of such a religious and ethnically diverse state.

Al-Sharaa has repeatedly promised to protect minorities and build an inclusive state for Syrians from all horizons and religions. But a series of events in the interval sowed mistrust between the ruling authorities and certain members of religious minority groups.

Massacres committed in the coastal region dominated by the Alaoues in March, followed by clashes Between the forces affiliated with the government and the Druze militias in May, rocked part of the good will and the faith that the new authorities had accumulated.

The attack on the church of Mar Elias is, of course, different in that it was perpetrated by an enemy of the new government. But he still contributed to the doubt that some have been felt by some that the security situation in Syria can improve – in particular, but not exclusively, for minorities.

And this uncertainty even pushes certain minorities to consider that they may have to abandon their homes in Syria and leave the country.

For many observers, in the end, the male stops with the authorities.

“The government will be judged according to what they do and how they solve the problem (of security),” said Jerome Drevon, principal analyst of the international crisis group and modern conflicts, in Al Jazeera, “including the question of religious minorities and how they protect them”.

Need for justice

The government said that it had been able to thwart two other attacks by the same cell behind the attack on Mar Elias, one of which was to target a Shiite Muslim sanctuary in Damascus.

ISIL has not yet claimed the attack, but would have made breakthroughs in Syria. The group had checked large area of ​​territory in Syria and Iraq as part of its self-proclaimed “caliphate” before a campaign led by the United States in 2019, and forced its leftovers to the peripherals.

Drevon said the group had been mainly present in the Eastern desert of Syria in recent years, until the American air strikes and the expansion of the Syrian government led them to push in the cities.

Isil now acts less as a hierarchical organization and more as a network of independent cells, said Drevon, which makes it difficult to fully eradicate it.

“There is to a certain extent a security vacuum because there is not enough forces to manage the full country,” said Drevon.

However, there is also room for positivity. Drevon noted that the government has had some success by supposing insurgents and, as collaboration with foreign governments is improving, the same goes for its information and its ability to thwart local attacks.

“There are cases of violence, of course, but the level of violence is far from what we expected six months ago,” said Drevon. “Even Western countries cannot fully prevent armed attacks.”

Analysts say that the Syrian authorities have concentrated not only on the prevention of group attacks such as ISIL, but also on the cessation of domestic insurrections, just like that along the Syrian coast in March launched by supporters of al-Assad, who then fell into sectarian murder and massacres.

In addition, the new authorities are trying to improve their intelligence capacities and their means of collaboration and receipt of information from foreign countries. Drevon said it was important for foreign governments to collaborate with the new intelligence administration to deal with what is probably an increasing threat to ISIL in the coming months.

But beyond the question of state’s ability to fight radical groups, it is also the importance of amplifying the message that religious and ethnic minorities are equal citizens in Syria, said Robin Yassin-Kassab, a Syrian writer.

The overthrow of Al-Assad was popular among the Syrians, and the months that followed enabled a new story to emerge in the country. But that can quickly disappear – especially if people do not feel that justice is underway for victims of all crimes, including those committed by those who are aligned with the State.

After violence on the coast and in highly arranged areas, the government of Al-Sharaa trained committees to investigate and attribute responsibility for violence and deaths. The new authorities have sometimes arrested people accused of having perpetuated or coordinated violence.

But some Syrians still do not believe that there is a transparent process or message in the distribution of justice clearly, equitably and also.

“(There is) no clear message that the authors will be arrested and punished for having committed crimes and no matter what political group or which identity, sect or regime, you are affiliated, you will be punished,” Yassin-Kassab told Al Jazeera. “It’s still not clear.”