The Druze religious sect, enmeshed in an outbreak of tit-for-tat violence in Syria, began roughly 1,000 years ago as an offshoot of Ismailism, a branch of Shiite Islam.

Syria's Islamist-led government said its security forces were deploying in the predominantly Druze southern city of Sweida on Saturday and urged all parties to respect a ceasefire after days of factional bloodshed in which hundreds have been killed.

Members of Syria's Druze community are searching for loved ones and counting their dead after days of clashes in a southern province that left bloodied bodies of civilians on the streets and homes looted.

Syria's Islamist-led government struggled to implement a ceasefire in the predominantly Druze region of Sweida on Saturday, with machinegun fire and mortar shelling ringing out after days of bloodshed.

Hundreds of Druze from Israel pushed across the border in solidarity with their Syrian cousins they feared were under attack. Many then met relatives they had never seen before.

At the center of a crisis in Syria are the Druze — a secretive religious minority that long carved out a precarious identity across Syria, Lebanon and Israel.

As a fragile ceasefire holds in southern Syria following deadly clashes, a Syrian Druze writer in exile Sarah Hunaidi tells CNN it’s a “horrible situation” on the ground, as food supplies run low and hospitals remain out of service.

Surgeon shot in the head as Syrian regime forces wearing Islamic State badges carry out bloody rampage, say witnesses