Mediated by a member of the opposition Syrian National Coalition (SNC), the talks between al-Qaeda affiliate Al-Nusra Front (ANF) and Lebanese MP Walid Jumblatt were successful, culminating in an agreement regarding the Druze community in the Syrian city of Idlib. The agreement reportedly requires the local Druze to convert to Sunni Islam and demolish their shrines, in return for ANF suspending Sharia-sanctioned punishments against them.
Walid Jumblatt’s declaration that ANF is not a terrorist group has not helped protect the Druze community in Syria and Lebanon, just as the support voiced by some Syrians for Daesh’s “other face” has not helped protect them from the ANF’s brutality, murder, and displacement. Indeed, Sunni Muslims have been targeted and tormented by the radical jihadi groups as much as — if not more than — other religious communities and tribes in Syria and Iraq.
Though Jumblatt has so far succeeded in averting the execution of the kidnapped Lebanese soldiers (the Druze soldiers) by exonerating ANF — which is proving adept at exploiting internal Lebanese political dynamics — the efforts of the head of the Progressive Socialist Party (PSP) have failed to dissuade the group from trying to forcibly convert the Druze in Jabal al-Summaq, northern Syria, to the Wahhabi brand of Islam.
Jumblatt previously called on the Druze to “return to Islam.” He has spared no occasion to proclaim that ANF is part of the fabric of the Syrian society, while PSP minister Wael Abu Faour said two weeks ago in a television that the al-Qaeda affiliate “includes doctors and engineers” in its ranks. Similarly, Walid Jumblatt has jumped at every opportunity over the past two weeks to try to dissuade Druze religious leaders in Lebanon from speaking out about the plight of their coreligionists.
A month and a half ago, Abu Abdul-Rahman al-Tunisi, ANF’s emir to Jabal al-Summaq, gave 14 Druze villages until February 1 to demolish their shrines and renounce their faith, or face the consequences. The residents of the villages complied, and forged an agreement with ANF representatives to that effect. The people of these 14 villages proceeded to demolish their shrines, and agreed to let ANF imams lead them in prayers in their temples, which were converted to mosques. But ANF was not satisfied. A number of its fighters ransacked the Druze shrines, while al-Tunisi vowed to enforce full-blown Sharia provisions in their villages.
Only Sheikh Ali Zine al-Din, the head of the Druze Irfan Foundation in Lebanon, denounced what happened publicly. This outrage among the ranks of Druze clerics put pressure on Jumblatt. This, in addition to the issue of the kidnapped Druze soldiers, whose families threatened to escalate their protests and to react fiercely if something happens to their relatives, compelled the head of the PSP to act.