TEL AVIV, July 18. /TASS/. Israel is ready to allow a limited contingent of Syria’s government forces to be present in the southern Sweida governorate, The Times of Israel reported.

According to a newspaper’s source, the Syrian "Internal security forces" will be allowed to enter Sweida for 48 hours.

The Israeli authorities said earlier that they will not tolerate the presence of Damascus’ forces in this region, the newspaper recalled, adding that this is probably the reason why now they talk about "internal security forces."

The situation in Syria aggravated on July 13 when clashes between Arab tribal militias and Druze self-defense groups broke out in the heavily Druze-populated Sweida governorate. On July 15, the Syrian army entered the governorate’s administrative center, the city of Sweida, and launched a mop-up operation to restore order. Shortly after, Israel began delivering airstrikes on Syrian army convoys, claiming that the operation was geared to protect the Druze population. On July 16, Israel hit a number of strategic targets in Damascus.

Late on July 16, the Syrian defense ministry announced the withdrawal of government forces from the city of Sweida under a ceasefire agreement. Unlike Hikmat al-Hijri, Druze spiritual leader Sheikh Yousef Jarboe hailed the agreement on the cessation of hostilities.

The Druze are a tight-knit ethnoreligious Arabic-speaking group living mainly in Syria, Lebanon, Israel, and Jordan who adhere to a specific faith that split from Shiite Islam in the Middle Ages. Israeli Druzes live in Galilee in the north of the country and serve in the Israeli army and police along with Jews. However, after Israel gained control over the Golan Heights in the Six-Day War in 1967, most of the Druzes living there have preserved their Syrian citizenship. Syria’s Druze population numbers around 700,000, being the third biggest ethnoreligious minority after the Kurds and Alawites.