Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu on Thursday said a ceasefire in Syria was “obtained by force,” after Israel struck military targets in Damascus in response to government troops attacking the Druze.


“It is a ceasefire obtained by force. Not by demands, not by pleas -- by force,” he said in a statement.

Netanyahu said that Israel had established a policy demanding the demilitarization of a swathe of territory near the border, stretching from the Israeli-occupied Golan Heights to the Druze Mountain, east of Sweida.

Government troops began their pull-out from the Druze heartland province of Sweida in southern Syria on Wednesday evening.

The pullout came as President Ahmed al-Sharaa said in a televised address that the “responsibility” for security in Sweida would be handed to religious elders and some local factions “based on the supreme national interest.”

Syrian government troops were dispatched to the Sweida region earlier this week to quell fighting between Druze fighters and Bedouin armed men but ended up clashing with the Druze militias.

Israel responded by carrying out strikes on Syrian forces, including its army headquarters in Damascus.

According to the text of the new ceasefire agreement, published by the interior ministry, there will be a “total and immediate halt to all military operations,” as well as the formation of a committee comprising government officials and Druze spiritual leaders to supervise its implementation.