In a diplomatic report sent from the US Embassy in Damascus to the State Department in Washington DC on 10 September 1946, a diplomat named "Mattison" recounted a meeting with Interior Minister Sabri al-Asali to address rumours that the people of Jabal al-Druze were seeking "separation from Syria." This came five months after French forces withdrew from Syria and four years after Jabal al-Druze was definitively reintegrated into the Syrian Republic.
The issue of the Druze mountain is not new; it predates the modern Syrian state itself. Today, it has resurfaced following recent Israeli statements about their intent to protect the Druze and the subsequent agreement reached with the new Syrian government on 12 March 2025, endorsed by the spiritual leader of the Druze community, Sheikh Hikmat al-Hijri.
The city of Sweida, the last stronghold of the Syrian revolution after the destruction of other rebel-held areas since 2011, became a symbol of unity for Syrians when it rose again in 2023, at a time when many had lost hope in the fall of Bashar al-Assad's regime.
Recently, as the Druze refused to surrender their weapons and raised the flag of a potential Druze state, talk of their possible secession gained traction, or the creation of an autonomous enclave, similar to the Kurdish model in eastern Syria. Such speculation faded, however, with the March agreement between the Druze and the new administration of President Ahmed al-Sharaa.
Yet, the issue has deep historical roots. British historian Albert Hourani noted during his visit to Jabal al-Druze in 1946 while preparing his seminal work on Middle Eastern minorities that the Druze have always maintained their "distinctiveness". They have never fully aligned with any ruler—whether Ibrahim Pasha of Egypt in the 1830s, the Ottomans, or the French. Even during Syria's independence, they regularly clashed with presidents Shukri al-Quwatli and Adib al-Shishakli.
French Mandate era
Like the Alawite Mountain, Jabal al-Druze was granted administrative independence from the rest of Syria at the start of the French Mandate, complete with its own laws, administration, and flag. The Druze state existed as an autonomous entity from 1921 until its annexation to Syria in 1937, only to be separated again before being reunified with Syria in 1942 under President Taj al-Din al-Hasani.
During his term, a Druze was appointed to a cabinet position for the first time in history: Abdul Ghaffar Pasha al-Atrash as Minister of Defense, succeeded upon his death by Emir Hasan al-Atrash, the husband of the famed singer Asmahan (Amal al-Atrash). Hasan al-Atrash facilitated the British Army's entry into Syria from Palestine to overthrow the Vichy regime during World War II, earning him favour with the Allies. In later years, several other Druze figures would hold senior ministerial posts, most notably Emir Adel Arslan, who became Minister of Foreign Affairs in 1949.
Among the Alawites were two factions: one separatist, advocating for maintaining autonomy, and the other unionist, seeking integration with the rest of Syria. The Druze had similar divisions, though the unionists always held the upper hand, thanks to their legendary leader Sultan Pasha al-Atrash, commander of the Great Syrian Revolt against the French in 1925.
When a delegation from the National Bloc went to Paris in 1936 to negotiate Syria's future, Hashim al-Atassi insisted on "Syrian territorial unity," a stance opposed by many Alawites and a small group of Druze, despite Sultan al-Atrash's support for unity and independence.
After al-Atassi's election as president in December 1936, Jabal al-Druze and the Alawite Mountain were annexed to Syria, ending 16 years of autonomy. Sultan al-Atrash returned to lead the Druze after a decade-long exile, but the central government in Damascus made a critical error by appointing the Damascene Sunni notable Nasib al-Bakri as governor of Jabal al-Druze, believing it would please the Druze since Bakri had fought alongside them in the 1925 Revolt.
Prime Minister Jamil Mardam Bey refused to reverse this decision, promising the Druze schools, roads, fair employment policies, and a verbal pledge to allocate their taxes for local development. Nevertheless, opposition to the central government grew under the leadership of Emir Hasan al-Atrash, who demanded exclusive governance of the mountain—a request that Mardam Bey would subsequently decree in February 1938.
Post-Mandate era
The integration of the two mountains with the rest of Syria did not last long. They were restored to their previous status following al-Atassi's resignation and the outbreak of World War II in 1939. Two years later, France decided to reunify Syria, annexing the mountains and declaring Syrian independence in September 1941 to gain Syrian support against Nazi Germany.
Jabal al-Druze was reintegrated into Syria in February 1942, and the separatist project was not revisited until the fall of 1946, a few months after the French withdrawal. The primary reason for reviving this project was the deteriorating relations between the Druze and the central government in Damascus, particularly after the Druze supported King Abdullah I of Jordan's "Greater Syria" project, which President Shukri al-Quwatli vehemently opposed, warning that it threatened Syria's republican system.
After returning to the premiership at the end of 1946, Jamil Mardam Bey began funding a pro-government Druze faction opposed to the Atrash family's electoral lists. The more the government interfered in Druze affairs, the louder their calls for secession and merging with Jordan became. In 1946, Emir Hasan al-Atrash presented Mardam Bey with a series of demands, including exclusive rights to the mountain's agricultural revenues and local military service for Druze conscripts, but both demands were flatly rejected by the government.
A 1947 US diplomatic cable noted that the Atrash family could "in a breeze, raise an army of 20,000 fighters to occupy Damascus and overthrow the government." At the time, the Druze population was around 100,000, or 3% of Syria's total population, mostly concentrated in Jabal al-Druze and its environs.
The report also noted that al-Quwatli did not take the Druze separatist threats seriously, knowing that the Jordanian government was "incapable of accommodating them geographically, politically, or financially," as the cost of administering their region during the Mandate had reached 4.5mn French francs annually—a sum King Abdullah could not afford and simply, did not have in his coffers. Thus, the separatist project stalled in the early years of independence, and the Druze united with other Syrian factions, including the central government, against Israel during the 1948 Palestine War.
Adib Shishakli era
Then came the 1953 bloody confrontation between the Druze and President Shishakli, after the security services discovered stockpiles of weapons in the Druze region, allegedly sent from Jordan to destabilise Syria. After coming to power—first by proxy in 1951 and then directly in 1953—Shishakli had notably neglected Jabal al-Druze, despite overseeing economic and industrial growth in other parts of Syria.
Sultan al-Atrash opposed the police state that emerged under Shishakli, who—unable to arrest the Druze leader due to his political stature—detained his son Mansour, a co-founder of the Ba'ath Party. The Druze refused to join Shishakli's Arab Liberation Movement, founded in 1952, and in the 1953 parliamentary elections, their participation rate was a mere 5% in protest against his rule.
Shishakli responded by dismissing many Druze officers and transferring prominent ones such as Amin Abu Assaf, to Deir ez-Zor. He also attacked the Druze village of Majdal Shams in the Golan, arresting 35 on charges of espionage for Israel, and accused the Druze of seeking to revive the independent Druze state of the French Mandate era.
Shishakli famously said, "My enemies are like a serpent: its head is in Jabal al-Druze, its stomach in Homs, and its tail in Aleppo. If you cut off the head, the snake dies." He attempted to "cut off the head" by shelling Jabal al-Druze before being overthrown by a military coup on 24 February 1954. Notably, during his campaign against the Druze, Shishakli had appointed Druze General Shawkat Shaqir as Chief of Staff of the Syrian Army to avoid accusations of sectarianism.
