What We Know About Clashes Between Security Forces, Assad Supporters in Syria

The domestic security authority imposed curfews in Latakia, Tartus, and Homs amid ongoing clashes that have become the fiercest since the change of power in Syria in December 2024

DUBAI, March 7. /TASS/. Clashes are ongoing in Syria between law enforcement units and supporters of the country’s former President Bashar Assad, prompting the transitional government to launch a large-scale operation and send reinforcements to Latakia and Tartus.

TASS has compiled the key facts about the situation in the country.

Clashes

- On March 6, a group of Assad's supporters attacked one of the checkpoints of the internal security directorate of the new Syrian administration in the vicinity of Jableh, a city near Russia's Hmeymim air base.

- The Al Jazeera TV channel reported that at least 15 Syrian security officers were killed in clashes.

- The state-run SANA news agency, in turn, reported that armed groups supporting the former president also attacked military sites in the settlement of Beit Ana in Latakia’s south.

- One Syrian security officer was killed, and several were injured in the attack.

- Lieutenant Colonel Mustafa Knefati, the head of the provincial police directorate, told the SANA news agency that remnants of pro-Assad militias attacked checkpoints and security patrols near Latakia, as well as government buildings, public and private properties.

- Knefati stressed that the Syrian authorities intend to end attacks on patrols and barracks in coastal areas.

- The Syria TV reported earlier that heavy gunfire was ongoing in the Al-Ziraa neighborhood and near the criminal police department, where blasts were also heard.

- According to the report, riot police have already repelled the attack of armed groups, which suffered losses.

- Units of the armed forces under Syria's interim government entered Latakia and Tartus to combat pro-Assad insurgents, the SANA news agency reported.

- Syria’s Internal Security Directorate has launched a large-scale security operation in key areas to neutralize militias and regain control over administrative centers, nearby localities, and mountainous areas.

- It called on supporters of the former head of state to surrender their arms.

Curfew

- The domestic security authority imposed curfews in Latakia, Tartus, and Homs amid ongoing clashes that have become the fiercest since the change of power in Syria in December 2024.

Arrest of former head of Syria's Air Intelligence Forces

- Syrian security forces have arrested Ibrahim Huweija, the former head of Syria's Air Intelligence Forces (from 1987 to 2002), Syria's state-run SANA news agency reported.

- Huweija, a powerful figure in Syria's intelligence apparatus, was accused of orchestrating the 1977 assassination of Kamal Jumblatt, who was a Lebanese Druze leader and founder of the Progressive Socialist Party.