DAMASCUS, Syria (AP) — A U.N.-backed commission that investigated sectarian violence on Syria’s coast earlier this year found that there was “widespread and systematic” violence against civilians perpetrated by some government-affiliated factions, but found no evidence that it was directed by the central government.
An extensive report released Thursday by the Independent International Commission of Inquiry on Syria examined the violence that began with clashes between armed groups aligned with former Syrian President Bashar Assad and the new government’s security forces in March. It spiraled into sectarian revenge attacks and massacres that killed hundreds of civilians from the Alawite religious minority to which Assad belongs.
The violence came months after Assad was ousted in a lightning rebel offensive in December, and at a time when the country's new rulers were attempting to forge a new national army out of a patchwork of former insurgent factions.
The commission named several government-affiliated factions whose members allegedly took part in “extrajudicial killings and torture and ill-treatment" of civilians in Alawite-majority areas “in a manner that was both widespread and systematic.”
They include the 62nd and 76th divisions of the new Syrian army, also known as the Sultan Suleiman Shah Brigade and the Hamza Division — both of them formerly part of a coalition made up of Turkish-backed armed factions in northwest Syria. The report also singled out the 400th Division, made up of former brigades of Hayat Tahrir al-Sham, an Islamist rebel group that was formerly led by Syria's current interim President Ahmad al-Sharaa.
However, the report said the commission "found no evidence of a governmental policy or plan to carry out such attacks." It also found that pro-Assad armed groups had committed “acts that likely amount to crimes, including war crimes."
A separate investigation into the coastal violence ordered by the government released its findings last month. It concluded that some members of the new Syrian military had committed “widespread, serious violations against civilians,” but said there was no evidence that military leaders had ordered those attacks. The government investigation found that more than 1,400 people, most of them civilians, were killed.
In a letter in response to Thursday's U.N. report, Syrian Foreign Minister Asaad al-Shibani said the government takes “serious note of the alleged violations” and that the recommendations — which included increased screening of recruits to the security forces and recruiting from minority communities — “will serve as a roadmap for Syria's continued progress.”
When asked how the government would deal with the divisions that allegedly carried out attacks on civilians, Ibrahim Olabi, legal advisor to the Foreign Ministry, said it was “too early” to speak in detail but that “we are seeking accountability within our capabilities... in order to achieve civil peace and to ensure that these violations are not repeated.”
The U.N. commission's report noted that in the leadup to the coastal violence in March there had been scattered clashes between pro-Assad and new government forces as well as increasing incidents of “harassment and violations" against Alawite communities, "including killings, abductions, looting or occupation of property.”
In early March, pro-Assad armed groups launched a series of attacks on the General Security forces of the new government along the coast. During the clashes that followed, pro-Assad fighters also overran hospitals, shot at and abducted journalists coming to cover the conflict, and in at least one case shot and killed women and children, the report said.
With the General Security forces overwhelmed, tens of thousands of fighters from allied factions, as well as armed civilians, converged on the coast. Many began raiding houses in Alawite-majority areas, where in a large number of cases they “asked civilians whether they were Sunni or Alawi” and ”Alawi men and boys were then taken away to be executed,” the report found.
“Most victims were men of Alawi background, aged between 20 to 50 years, though women and children as young as one year old were also killed during house raids,” the report said. In some cases, the bodies were desecrated and family members were prevented from burying their dead.
The report also found that there had been widespread cases of robbery and looting by armed groups.
The commission also investigated reports of kidnapping of Alawite women and found “credible information” of at least six cases in the weeks preceding and following the main outbreak of violence in March. It is investigating “dozens” of other reports. In at least two of the confirmed cases, the victims were “abducted for the purpose of forced marriage,” while in other cases the kidnappers demanded ransoms from the victims' families.
In one particularly disturbing case prior to the coastal clashes, the report said masked men dressed in black and wearing black headbands inscribed with “There is no god but God” abducted a woman from the street and gang-raped her, then sold her to an older man to whom she was forcibly married.
“The Commission is not aware of any individuals being arrested or prosecuted yet in connection with these abductions,” the report said.
Olabi said the allegations are “criminal matters under investigation by the security authorities” and are separate from the investigation into the March coastal violence.
The report comes as Syria is reeling from another outbreak of sectarian violence last month that has again threatened the country's fragile political transition after nearly 14 years of civil war.
This time, clashes broke out in the southern Sweida province between government forces and local Bedouin tribesmen on one side, and fighters from the country’s Druze minority on the other. Hundreds were killed and tens of thousands displaced, and allegations have surfaced of government fighters executing Druze civilians and looting and burning houses.
The government has again launched an investigation into the allegations, but minority communities have become increasingly wary of the Sunni Muslim-led authorities. Last week, representatives of Syria’s various ethnic and religious groups held a conference in Kurdish-controlled northeastern Syrian city and called for the formation of a decentralized state and the drafting of a new constitution that guarantees religious, cultural and ethnic pluralism.
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Sewell reported from Beirut.
FILE - Red Crescent workers carry a wounded man outside the Russian air base in Hmeimim, near Latakia in Syria's coastal region on March 11, 2025, as they evacuate wounded members of the Alawite sect who have sought refuge there following recent violence and revenge killings. (AP Photo/Omar Albam, File)
JERUSALEM (AP) — Israeli police forcibly entered the compound of the United Nations agency for Palestinian refugees in east Jerusalem early Monday, escalating a campaign against the organization that has been banned from operating on Israeli territory.
The U.N. Relief and Works Agency for Palestinian Refugees, or UNRWA, said in a statement that “sizable numbers” of Israeli forces, including police on motorcycles, trucks and forklifts, entered the compound in the Palestinian neighborhood of Sheikh Jarrah.
“The unauthorized and forceful entry by Israeli security forces is an unacceptable violation of UNRWA’s privileges and immunities as a U.N. agency,” the statement said.
Meanwhile, officials said President Donald Trump will meet with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu on Dec. 29 as U.S. officials meet with Netanyahu to move ahead with a U.S.-brokered plan on the future of Gaza. It was not immediately clear where the leaders will meet.
The raid was the latest in Israel's campaign against the agency, which provides aid and services to some 2.5 million Palestinian refugees in Gaza, the occupied West Bank and east Jerusalem, as well as 3 million more refugees in Syria, Jordan and Lebanon.
Photos taken by an Associated Press photographer show police erecting an Israeli flag on the compound, and police cars on the street. Photos provided by UNRWA staff show a group of Israeli police officers in the compound.
Police said in a statement they entered for a “debt-collection procedure” initiated by Jerusalem’s municipal government, which did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
The agency was established to help the estimated 700,000 Palestinians who fled or were driven out of what is now Israel during the 1948 war surrounding the creation of the Israeli state. UNRWA supporters say Israel hopes to erase the Palestinian refugee issue by dismantling the agency. Israel says the refugees should be permanently resettled outside its borders.
For months following the start of the Israel-Hamas war began on Oct. 7, 2023, UNRWA was the main lifeline for Gaza's population during Israel's offensive there.
Throughout the war, Israel has accused the agency of being infiltrated by Hamas, using its facilities and taking aid — claims for which it has provided little evidence. The U.N. has denied it. Israel also has claimed that hundreds of Palestinian militants work for UNRWA. UNRWA has denied knowingly aiding armed groups and says it acts quickly to purge any suspected militants.
After months of attacks from Netanyahu and his far-right allies, Israel banned it from operating on its territory in January. The U.S., formerly the largest donor to UNRWA, halted funding to the agency in early 2024.
UNRWA has since struggled to continue its work in Gaza, with other U.N. agencies, including the World Food Program and UNICEF, stepping in. Tamara Alrifai, UNRWA’s director of external relations and communications, said UNRWA has been excluded from ceasefire talks.
“If you squeeze UNRWA out, what other agency can fill that void?” Alrifai said.
Netanyahu met with the U.S. ambassador to the U.N., Mike Waltz, and other officials on Monday in a visit the Trump administration said was aimed at pushing forward the U.S.-drafted 20-point plan for Gaza that includes the current ceasefire and following stages.
Israel’s government later said Trump and Netanyahu would meet on Dec. 29 to “discuss the future steps and phases and the international stabilization force of the ceasefire plan.”
With the remains of one hostage in Gaza yet to be handed over to Israel, Arab and Western officials have said they expect an international governing body in Gaza to be announced in the coming weeks. A search was underway on Monday for the hostage's remains, Hamas said.
On Sunday, a senior Hamas official told the AP the group is ready to discuss “freezing or storing or laying down” its arsenal of weapons as part of the ceasefire, offering a possible formula to resolve one of the thorniest issues in the U.S.-brokered agreement.
The war started when Hamas-led militants attacked southern Israel, leaving around 1,200 people dead and abducting 251 others.
Israel's retaliatory offensive has killed at least 70,360 Palestinians, according to Gaza’s Health Ministry, which operates under the Hamas-run government. The ministry does not differentiate between civilians and combatants, but says nearly half the dead have been women and children. The ministry's numbers are considered reliable by the U.N. and other international bodies.
The ministry also says over 370 Palestinians have been killed in Israeli strikes since the ceasefire took effect.
Violence has also risen in the Israeli-occupied West Bank, where Israel’s military shot and killed one man Sunday night. Officials said he was throwing rocks at soldiers with two others, one of whom was arrested. Palestinian health officials said the third man was wounded. The military said no soldiers were injured.
Palestinian authorities identified the man killed as a 19-year-old from the northern city of Qalqilya.
Israel began construction of a 50-mile (80-kilometer) barrier along its border with Jordan, Israel’s defense minister said Monday.
Israel Katz said the construction was aimed at preventing “efforts of Iran and its proxies to establish an eastern front against the state of Israel.”
The final project will include increased security along 310 miles (500 kilometers) of border areas in eastern Israel, and would cost the government around $1.7 billion, according to Israeli government figures.
Associated Press writer Josef Federman in Doha, Qatar, contributed to this report.
This version corrects the last name of the U.S. ambassador to the United Nations to Waltz.
Find more of AP’s Israel-Hamas coverage at https://apnews.com/hub/israel-hamas-war
Hamas militants and Egyptian workers accompanied by members of the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) head to Zeitoun neighborhood of Gaza City to search for the remains of deceased hostages, Monday, Dec. 8, 2025. (AP Photo/Jehad Alshrafi)
Hamas militants and Egyptian workers accompanied by members of the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) head to Zeitoun neighborhood of Gaza City to search for the remains of deceased hostages, Monday, Dec. 8, 2025. (AP Photo/Jehad Alshrafi)
FILE - People carry sacks and boxes of food and humanitarian aid that was unloaded from a World Food Program convoy that had been heading to Gaza City in the northern Gaza Strip, June 16, 2025. (AP Photo/Jehad Alshrafi, File)
FILE - Palestinians grab sacks of flour from a moving truck carrying World Food Programme aid as it drives through Deir al-Balah in central Gaza, Nov. 15, 2025. (AP Photo/Abdel Kareem Hana, File)
Israeli police and officials hang an Israeli flag on the compound of the United Nations agency for Palestinian refugees in East Jerusalem, after Israel police forcibly entered the compound, Monday, Dec. 8, 2025. (AP Photo/Mahmoud Illean)
FILE - Offices of the United Nations agency for Palestinian refugees, known as UNRWA, are seen in the Shuafat refugee camp in Jerusalem, Monday, Jan. 27, 2025. (AP Photo/Mahmoud Illean, File)
