Heba’s days are spent thinking about a city on the other side of the world

Two cousins and her aunt are dead, and Heba Kassoua’s grandfather’s home has been burned to the ground.

The 36-year-old Australian citizen lives and works in Parramatta but, over the past month, most of her days have been spent thinking about her family in Sweida, a city in southern Syria. Violence broke out in mid-July, one of the first major surges of conflict since dictator Bashar al-Assad was toppled in December.

Clashes had been escalating between armed groups of Syrian Bedouin tribes and the militia representing the local Druze population, a religious minority native to the region, before the interim Syrian government had sent local security forces in and further inflamed the situation. Israel, which has its own Druze minority, launched air strikes on Sweida and Damascus, which it says were in support of the Druze.

In addition to the more than 1500 people killed during the violence, about 349 of whom were executed according to the Britain-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights, the UN estimates more than 190,000 people have been displaced. A fragile ceasefire has mostly held since July 19.

Five members of Kassoua’s family – all Druze – are among the dead. Her aunt, Ghossen Kassoua, died after spending five days inside her sister’s home in a village that came under attack.

“There wasn’t anyone who could go out and get her medication [for a heart condition and diabetes],” Kassoua said. “The doctors were either attending to the injured or couldn’t do house calls and her condition got much worse. She ended up passing away while she was still in lockdown. She was dead and they couldn’t even bury her until two days after.”

More than 300 members of Australia’s Druze community have written to the federal government pleading for Australian support for aid in the region.

“We are calling for the government to condemn the sectarian violence publicly and demand an independent investigation. We want humanitarian aid,” Kassoua said.

Kassoua, who has worked as a translator for the police and government, as an SBS journalist and who was listed on Labor’s ticket for the 2024 local council elections, said the letter was about more than just the survival of the famously tight Druze community, and was also concerned with violence against Alawite, Christian and Assyrian communities across Syria.

She will meet with the government next week.

Druze making Sydney home

Kassoua is one of the 4268 Druze living in Australia, according to the latest census. Many have settled in Adelaide, the Central Coast and western Sydney. Their faith is an Abrahamic religion, separate from Islam, which does not allow conversion into the faith and discourages interfaith marriages.

Her parents were among the first to migrate to Australia in the mid-1980s, after her father was jailed and tortured by the Assad regime. The couple donated money to help establish a community centre for special events and gatherings in Guildford when they first arrived.

The Sydney Morning Herald has opened a bureau in the heart of Parramatta. Email parramatta@smh.com.au with news tips.