MENA Minorities

by Rami Abou Diab and Tobias Lang Islamist pressure on Druze villages in Idlib Three weeks ago a previous posting on this Blog about the situation of the Druze in northern Syria (Jabal al-A‘la or Jabal as-Summaq) stated, that " If it is true, that Kaftin or other Druze villages are under the control of ISIS, the inhabitants are faceing extremely hard times". While  end of October  an attack by  al-Qaida affiliated  ISIS on the village of Kaftin had been prevented by villagers of surrounding Sunni settlements and/or FSA elements, around December 22 the Islamist pressure on the 18 Druze villages in the area  intensified (for a detailed map see here ). Reports started to circulate, according to which the inhabitants of the Druze villages had declared their conversion to Islam.  A four page long declaration by sheikhs of the villages was posted on social media by activists connected to ISIS and Jabhat an-Nusra , which may indicate it wa...

Background [i] The Druze community in Idlib province lives in or near the Jabal al-A ʿ la - or Jabal as-Summaq in the north of the province, close to the Turkish border in a rural and relatively isolated environment. These communities are the most northern Druze settlements and also the weakest and politically less important. Druze villages in northern Syria auf einer größeren Karte anzeigen The 17 [ii]  villages are mostly relatively small and situated in a predominately Sunni environment. This unfavourable setting let to mass migration to the Druze centers in  Suwaidaʾ , Mount Lebanon and nowadays Israel, where Halabi (meaning from Aleppo district, to which the area belonged then - Halab in Arabic) is a common family name nowadays. Without a real power base, vulnerable and far away from the Druze centers in Mount Lebanon and later southern Syria, the remaining Druze of Idlib province had to find a way to get along with their...