US Watchdog: Syrian Government Allies Continue Deadly Attacks Against Christians and Other Minorities (Worthy News In-Depth)
by Stefan J. Bos, Worthy News Chief International Correspondent
WASHINGTON/DAMASCUS (Worthy News) – The U.S. government’s watchdog investigating persecution of Christians and other religious groups has warned that allies of Syria’s government and other groups continue their deadly crackdown on Christians and other minorities, including Druze and Shia Muslims.
The U.S. Commission on International Religious Freedom (USCIRF) observed that little progress has been made since Syrian rebels, many affiliated with Hay’at Tahrir al-Sham (HTS), toppled Syrian President Bashar al-Assad’s regime in late 2024.
In a new report, the USCIRF said that HTS members, including foreign fighters, engaged in “mass killings” and other attacks against Christians and other minorities during and after the overthrow of Assad when they took over the government.
The report comes after at least one attacker opened fire and detonated an explosive inside the Greek Orthodox Mar Elias Church in Damascus, the capital, on June 22, killing and injuring scores of people.
Officials said at least about 30 people were killed and more than 50 others injured, adding to anxiety within Syria’s already dwindling Christian minority. While no group claimed responsibility, HTS officials blamed the Islamic State group, also known as ISIS, and condemned the attack.
Yet the USCIRF suggested this wasn’t an isolated incident since Syria’s new President, Ahmed al-Sharaa, came to power.
He commanded HTS during the revolution after being a member of al-Qaida, the designated terror group that claimed the September 11, 2001, terror attacks in the United States that killed thousands.
In addition to HTS, the report noted that members of Turkish-backed political opposition and militias (TSOs) and other groups linked to massacres and religious liberty violations received high-ranking positions in Syria’s new government.
PROTECTING LIBERTY
Despite these developments, the new Syrian government vowed “to protect religious liberty” when it formed as the new government.
Encouraged by these pledges, U.S. President Donald J. Trump’s administration sought to work with the new leadership, lifted sanctions, and removed HTS’ designation as a terrorist organization.
However, the USCIRF urged the Trump administration “to impose conditions” on sanction removals such as improvements in religious liberty.
The report also asked the U.S. government to impose targeted sanctions on people and groups that violate religious freedom.
USCIRF Commissioner Mohamed Elsanousi told the Catholic News Agency (CNA) that the commission’s primary concern for Syria’s Christians and other religious minorities is “that the transitional authorities’ actual policies and actions match their claims of supporting a religiously inclusive future for the country.”
“The U.S. administration must condition its lifting of sanctions with clear measures so that the emerging government fully abandons its extremist past, extends equal protection to all religious minorities, and enshrines comprehensive religious freedom into Syria’s laws and institutions,” Elsanousi stressed.
The USCIRF noted that following the December 2024 collapse of Bashar al-Assad’s regime, Christians in Syria have faced renewed threats from the HTS-led new transitional authorities.
POLICY UPDATE
The USCIRF July 2025 policy update noted that besides the recent church attack, Christians fled Aleppo and Hama “in fear of religious repression” based on HTS’s harsh policies elsewhere in the Idlib area, including “enforced prayer rules, sex segregation, and torture of dissidents.”
Though HTS reportedly instructed fighters not to attack Christian institutions, there were numerous early reports of assaults, the USCIRF recalled. It said there had been confirmed reports that two churches in Hama were attacked with gunfire and vandalized in December 2024.
In Aleppo, Kurdish Christians reported instances of intimidation. A Christian woman was forced to wear a hijab by HTS affiliates, despite identifying as Christian, according to USCIRF investigators.
Also in March, Syriac Orthodox Christians who lived near anti-Alawite violence reported that the Christian death toll was “three people,” while other persecutions against Christians reportedly took place.
Additionally, Christian cemeteries were desecrated, and crosses vandalized while
In areas like Tartus, “Christians were taunted and looted at checkpoints by Islamist militia members,” the USCIRF said.
Christians in mixed areas faced “increased harassment” at the hands of foreign HTS fighters, reportedly from Central Asia and China, the USCIRF report said.
It suggested that the June 2025 bombing of the Mar Elias Greek Orthodox Church in Damascus, in which scores of people died, underscored broader concerns over violence against Christians and other minorities.
NUMEROUS ATTACKS
Despite promises by HTS-led authorities to protect Christian communities, numerous credible reports document physical attacks, intimidation, destruction of Christian property, and structural discrimination in post-Assad Syria, researchers concluded.
Other minorities suffered as well.
The most egregious violence after the new government took control was reportedly waged against Alawite Muslims — a Shia sect to which Assad and many of his allies belonged — and against Druze — an Abrahamic religion that is separate from Islam, Christianity, and Judaism, according to investigators.
According to the USCIRF report, unidentified rebels burned the homes of civilian Alawites in Latakia and waged an arson attack against an Alawite shrine in Aleppo last December.
It also noted that men who may have been affiliated with the new government executed Alawites and members of the Twelver Shia sect in the Hama province.
The report added that in January and February, HTS loyalists conducted “door-to-door interrogations and select executions” of Alawite Muslims around the Mediterranean coast. In March, “the murders escalated to full-blown sectarian massacres” of Alawites in Latakia and Tartus based on allegations of “pro-Assad remnants.”
“Tallies put the confirmed death toll at between 1,700 and 2,246, with the caveat that the actual numbers might be much higher,” the report stressed.
PERSECUTION CONTINUES
The report references additional reports of civilian massacres of Alawites “with no known links to the Assad regime” during that time frame.
It recalled that persecutions against Alawites seem to have decreased since March but that, as recently as May, there were reports of fighters who may have been affiliated with the government kidnapping Alawites.
Additionally, “a new wave of killings” against Druze began in April, according to the report.
This includes “militant Islamist” supporters of the new government, who killed 134 people in a suburb of Damascus that month.
There were some positive developments, too. “In January, an ISIS plot to bomb a Shi’a shrine was reportedly thwarted by transitional authorities, indicating some willingness to protect religious sites.”
Yet the report clarified that Syria still faces a rocky road toward more religious freedom.
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