US Ambassador to Turkey and Special Envoy for Syria Tom Barrack announced on Friday night that Israel and Syria have agreed to a ceasefire.
"Israeli Prime Minister Netanyahu and Syrian President Ahmed al-Sharaa, supported by the USA, have agreed to a ceasefire embraced by Türkiye, Jordan and its neighbors,” Barrack wrote in a post on X.
“We call upon Druze, Bedouins, and Sunnis to put down their weapons and together with other minorities build a new and united Syrian identity building peace and prosperity with their neighbors," he added.
The announcement follows the clashes in recent days between Bedouin and Druze in the Sweida region of Syria, which prompted the Syrian army to intervene.
On Thursday, the Syrian army withdrew from Sweida after the IDF carried out strikes on the Syrian regime's central headquarters as well as the presidential palace in Damascus.
The clashes in Sweida broke out again on Friday, before Barrack’s announcement, leading Syria’s government to announce that it will redeploy forces to the area.
Al-Sharaa delivered a televised speech early Thursday morning in which he accused Israel of attempting to undermine Syria’s internal stability.
“The Israeli entity has always accustomed us to attempts to harm our stability and create fratricidal wars - since the fall of the Assad regime,” he claimed.
Al-Sharaa further claimed that Israel aims to turn Syria into a zone of anarchy, drag it into internal conflicts, and divide the country.
He stated that Syria faced a choice of direct confrontation with Israel but chose, in his words, the interest of the Syrian people, entrusting the responsibility for maintaining security in the Sweida region to local factions and the Druze leadership.
(Israel National News' North American desk is keeping you updated until the start of Shabbat in New York. The time posted automatically on all Israel National News articles, however, is Israeli time.)