Israel is supplying weapons and paying salaries to thousands of Druze fighters in southern Syria, while Damascus, under US pressure, accelerates talks with Jerusalem over a possible security agreement that Syrian officials hope will secure the return of recently lost territory, Reuters reported Tuesday.
According to two senior Druze commanders and a Western intelligence source, Israel is providing military supplies, including arms and ammunition, to Druze militias in the Suwayda region in southwestern Syria. They said Israel is also paying salaries to many of the roughly 3,000 Druze fighters active there.
At the same time, four sources involved in the discussions told Reuters that Washington is pressing Syria and Israel to advance negotiations so that US President Donald Trump can announce a breakthrough at the upcoming United Nations General Assembly later this month. One Israeli security source said, "The US is pressuring Syria to move forward with the security deal. This is personal for Trump," adding that "Israel is not offering much, despite the American president's desire."
The talks are reportedly centered on restoring the 1974 disengagement agreement that followed the Yom Kippur War, securing an Israel Defense Forces withdrawal from southeastern Syria, and halting Israeli airstrikes and ground raids there. Sources stressed the issue of the Golan Heights has not been part of the current talks. A Syrian official told Reuters that Damascus prefers to leave the Golan dispute for future negotiations, noting Syrian President Ahmed al-Sharaa believes "any compromise over the Golan would end his rule."
Israeli officials, however, have flatly ruled out concessions on the Golan Heights. According to Reuters, Israel suggested instead a withdrawal from parts of southern Syria in exchange for Damascus renouncing its claim to the strategic plateau. "Our inquiries through the Americans suggest this is not open for discussion," an Israeli official said.
A senior US official said Trump made clear when he met al-Sharaa in Riyadh in May that he expects Syria to pursue peace and normalization with Israel and its neighbors. "The president wants peace across the Middle East," the official said.
The push for talks comes amid growing unrest in Sweida, where massacres carried out by al-Sharaa's forces against the Druze population have fueled calls for breaking away from the Syrian regime and forming an autonomous administration. Israel has moved to unify fragmented Druze factions in the region, according to the two Druze commanders.
Reuters noted it could not independently verify claims of Israeli arms deliveries or payments, and neither Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu's office nor Strategic Affairs Minister Ron Dermer's office provided a comment. Two Syrian sources and a Western diplomat said Dermer met Syrian Foreign Minister Assad al-Shabani in Paris, in what they described as a tense encounter marked by mutual distrust.
According to Reuters, the negotiations are envisioned as a gradual process, similar to the talks that eventually produced Israel's 1979 peace treaty with Egypt. But Syrian sources emphasized that while al-Sharaa is willing to speed up contacts to please Trump, "the basic foundations of trust simply do not exist," as one put it.
