Syria's Sweida province has been engulfed by nearly a week of violence triggered by clashes between Bedouin fighters and Druze factions. Earlier on Friday, an Israeli official said Israel agreed to allow Syrian forces limited access to the Sweida area of southern Syria for the next two days.

Iran’s Parliament Speaker Mohammad Bagher Ghalibaf has warned that Israel’s recent strikes on Damascus signal a wider agenda of destabilization, disarmament, and division across the Islamic world.

The Israel Defense Forces (IDF) said the Damascus headquarters served as a command center for deploying regime forces to Suwayda, a southern Syrian region gripped by days of deadly clashes between government troops, Druze militias, and Bedouin groups.

Israel launched powerful airstrikes in Damascus on Wednesday, blowing up part of the defence ministry and hitting near the presidential palace as it vowed to destroy government forces attacking Druze in southern Syria and demanded they withdraw.

P LUMES OF SMOKE rose over Damascus on July 16th as Israeli warplanes struck Syria’s capital. Targeting the presidential palace, the defence ministry and the army command, the attack killed at least one person and wounded several others.

Israel carried out heavy airstrikes in the heart of Damascus on Wednesday, hitting Syrian Defense Ministry headquarters and an area near the presidential palace.

The Israeli military said it had "struck the entrance gate" of the Syrian regime's military headquarters complex in Damascus.

Secretary of State Rubio says the U.S. is "very concerned" by expanding Israeli strikes targeting Syria's new government, and he wants "the fighting to stop."

Hundreds of people have been killed in days of violence in southern Syria which began with clashes between members of the Druze minority group and Bedouin tribes and drew a military intervention from Syria.

A strong central government in Damascus appeals to Trump but not to his allies in Israel. Once again, images of horrifying violence are pouring out of Syria: dead bodies piled up in a hospital corridor. Gunmen calling out insults as they drive their cars over the corpses of murdered civilians.