Israeli warplanes pounded Syrian government buildings in Damascus, escalating its campaign against Syria’s new authorities amid heavy clashes between government forces and the country’s Druze minority.

The high-profile strike came amid a wave of sectarian violence in the southern Syrian city of Sweida, where the Druze population has clashed with local Bedouin Sunni tribes and the recently installed Syrian government, headed by Interim President Ahmed Al-Sharaa who toppled former President Bashar Al-Assad in December.

Israel bombed the Syrian army headquarters in Damascus on Wednesday after warning the Islamist-led government to leave the Druze minority alone in its Sweida heartland, where a war monitor says sectarian clashes have killed nearly 250 people.

The Syrian Observatory for Human Rights, a U.K.-based war monitor, said the clashes started after members of a Bedouin tribe in Sweida province set up a checkpoint where they attacked and robbed a Druze man, leading to tit-for-tat attacks and kidnappings between the tribes and Druze armed groups.

Israel threatened to escalate attacks on Syrian government forces unless they withdrew from Sweida, a southern province dominated by the Druse minority.

An Israeli military official said, "we are reinforcing forces in the Golan Heights and along the border, ready for a multitude of scenarios."

Israeli officials react to the ongoing violence in Syria's Sweida between regime forces and the local Druze community. Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu urged Israeli Druze citizens not to cross the border amid ongoing clashes in Sweida in southern Syria on Wednesday afternoon.

The two sides have a longstanding feud in Sweida. Government forces sent reinforcements to the region, in the country’s south, saying they want to re-establish security. But according to witnesses, Druze armed groups and the Syrian Observatory for Human ...