March, an ill-starred month for Druze leaders

Clockwise from top: Sultan Pasha al-Atrash, Kamal Jumblatt and Sheikh Ahmad Salman al-Hajri

Lebanon’s foremost Druze leader Walid Jumblatt restated today his call on residents of the Syrian Druze stronghold of Jabal al-Arab, also known as Jabal al-Druze, to join the Syrian uprising against President Bashar al-Assad.

His appeal came in a cable to Syrian activist Muntaha al-Atrash on the occasion of the 30^th anniversary of the death of her father, Sultan Pasha al-Atrash.

Jumblatt wrote Atrash in the cable posted on the website of his Progressive Socialist Party, “On the occasion of the anniversary of the death of Sultan Pasha al-Atrash, which coincides with the martyrdom of Kamal Jumblatt… we renew the call to our Jabal al-Arab brethren to enlist in the revolution in keeping with their struggle and patriotism history…”

March seems an ill-starred month for Druze leaders.

Sultan Pasha al-Atrash was 91 when he passed away on March 26, 1982.

Walid’s father, Kamal Jumblatt, was shot dead in his car on March 16, 1977, as it approached a Syrian military checkpoint in Lebanon’s Chouf district.

And the highest spiritual leader of Syria’s 700,000-strong Druze community, Sheikh al-‘Aql Ahmad Salman al-Hajri, was killed on Sunday, March 25, in a car accident which Syrian activists say was staged by the regime.

In today's Kuwaiti daily al-Watan, columnist Fuad al-Hashem says a Syrian “military vehicle” rammed Hajri’s car and killed him after he “refused on three occasions to appear on state TV to endorse Assad.”

Also today, Yacoub Kara, a Druze legislator in Israel’s Knesset, is quoted as saying Hajri’s death was staged in an “accident” that is archetypal for eliminating regime opponents in Syria.

“Suspicious death” of Syria Druze spiritual leader

The late Sheikh Ahmad Salman al-Hajri

An array of Syrian activists are accusing President Bashar al-Assad’s regime of staging the “car accident” that killed Sheikh al-‘Aql Ahmad Salman al-Hajri, the highest spiritual leader of Syria’s 700,000-strong Druze community.

A rugged and mountainous region in southwest Syria known as Jabal al-Arab is more than 90 percent Druze-inhabited. Some 120 villages are exclusively Druze-populated.

There are only two Syrian provinces in which Sunni Moslems are not a majority: Soueida, where Druze predominate, and Latakia, where Alawites are a majority.

A statement by the state-run Syrian News Agency (SANA) said Hajri, a 1954 native of Soueida who succeeded his father Salman as Syria’s Sheikh al-‘Aql in 1989, died in a “tragic” two-car collision on the Mardak-Shahba road.

Syrian activists say the regime staged yesterday’s “car accident” to get rid of Hajri for withstanding pressure to endorse its crackdown on the uprising.

One website carries these two comments on the foul play, which if substantiated could mobilize Syria’s Druze against Assad:

Sultan Pasha al-Atrash and daughter Muntaha

1. “After his stands, which were growing ever closer to the Syrian revolution’s and his rows with security officials in Soueida for refusing to support Assad, Sheikh Ahmad al-Hajri was killed in a staged car accident, according to our informed sources in restive Shahba.”
2. “Is it pure coincidence to have three Soueida people killed in car accidents? They are Fadlallah Hijaz, who had served 10 years in prison; Kamal al-Maghoush, a former army officer who served 15 years; and now Hajri.”

The Syrian regime’s two most prominent Druze opponents are Lebanon’s Walid Jumblatt and Syria’s Muntaha al-Atrash, daughter of Sultan Pasha al-Atrash, who led the 1925-1927 Syrian revolution against the French.