The Alawites know that their enemy is not Israel – analysis

The Alawites were well aware of the warning given to the Syrians by Defense Minister Israel Katz on March 1.

By Hugh Fitzgerald, Frontpage Magazine

Alawites in Syria are hoping for Israel’s protection: “Alawite Syrians to ‘Post’: We need Israel’s help from jihadist atrocities – exclusive,” by Ohad Merlin, Jerusalem Post, March 11, 2025:

B. is planning to meet with Israeli officials in an attempt to promote a protective Israeli umbrella to the Alawite community in Syria. “There are five million Alawites in Syria, and many of them are begging for Israel’s support and protection,” B. said….

B. believes there are “five million” Alawites in Syria. This a clear case of wish-fulfillment. Even if we were to accept, as some do, that the Alawites are 12-15% of the Syrian population, and to use that 15% figure, then — given that Syria has a current population of 25 million — that would come to 3.75 million Alawites.

Most outside estimates give a figure of three million Alawites in Syria.

With that number, even though they were the backbone of Assad’s army, many have had military training and have kept their weapons, those three million Alawites would still have trouble withstanding the jihadists now in power in Damascus should they decide to inflict still more atrocities on the Alawites.

After two days of massacres of Alawites in Latakia and Tartous by Sunni Arabs, most of the latter belonging to the security services, though there were also others — freelance killers — who were seeking revenge against any Alawite they could get their hands on, for they blamed all the Alawites, no matter how innocent, for their assumed support for the murderous Bashar al-Assad.

The Alawites were well aware of the warning given to the Syrians by Defense Minister Israel Katz on March 1, who said, “We will not allow the extreme Islamic regime in Syria to harm the Druze. If the regime harms them , it will be struck by us.”

Once that warning was issued, the regime’s gunmen withdrew from Jaramana, the Druze town on the southern outskirts of Damascus.

What the call by some Alawites for similar protection to that now provided by Israel to the Druze demonstrates is that the Alawites know that Israelis are not a sinister enemy, as they were taught to believe.

It is doubtful that the Israelis would be able to offer the help to the Alawites that it has done for the Druze. The Druze in Syria are right on the border with Israel.

Tens of thousands of Druze live in Israel’s part of the Golan Heights, which the Jewish state annexed in 1981.

On the Syrian part of the Golan that the IDF has just taken over, intending to stay, are tens of thousands.

Israel’s Druze serve in the IDF, and thus have earned Israel’s assurance that the Druze in Syria — there are 600,000 of them — if threatened by the jihadist regime, will have the Jewish state’s protection.

The Alawites in Latakia are much farther away from Israel than the Druze — some 250 miles from the Israeli border. There would be no easy way for the IDF to provide them with arms by land; the Syrian security forces would try to block such deliveries, and though much weaker than the IDF, the Syrians would certainly inflict casualties.

It is doubtful that Jerusalem, despite the Jewish state’s sympathies for the Alawite civilians who are under such a threat, would want to intervene.

The new head of the IDF General Staff, Major General Eyal Zamir, says that 2025 will “be a year of war” and that Israel will focus “on Gaza and Iran.”

Syria, for now, is in a state of disarray, and the IDF attacks on its airbases and weapons storehouses, which took place the day after Assad left for Moscow, have managed to remove most of the major weapons from Syria’s arsenal.

Israel will protect the Druze, but that is the extent of the IDF’s protective umbrella.

The Alawites in Latakia may still be able to be supplied by their fellow Shi’ites in Iran; the Iranian government has denounced the “genocide” of the Alawites.

We’ll see if those words are matched by deeds — that is, by weapons being delivered to the Alawites from the mullahs in Tehran.