Global News Podcast - Syria withdrawing its army from Druze-majority Sweida city

Episode Date: July 17, 2025

Syria says its army has begun to withdraw from the mainly Druze city of Sweida - after days of deadly clashes. Also: eight babies have been born in UK using three people's DNA to prevent genetic disease.

This BBC podcast is supported by ads outside the UK. deal ratings and price history. So you know a great deal when you see one. That's cargurus.ca. This is the Global News Podcast from the BBC World Service. I'm Valerie Sanderson and in the early hours of Thursday the 17th of July these are our main stories. The Syrian government has started to withdraw its forces from the southern province and city of Sweda, following Israel's bombing of Syria in defence, it says, of the Druze minority living there. President Trump has denied he's about to fire the chairman of the US Federal Reserve, Jerome Powell, after reports that sent bank shares sliding. British doctors have announced that eight babies have been born using genetic material from three people

in order to prevent devastating and often fatal conditions. Also in this podcast, the large rock from Mars. It's a fantastic rock. It's huge. Yes, it would be great if it was in a museum for people to see and if it was part of a scientific collective for analyses to be done. But it is something that is worth quite a lot. And it's sold at auction for $5.3 million. As we record this podcast, Syria says its army has begun to withdraw from the predominantly Druze city of Sweda after days of deadly clashes.

According to Syria, it comes after an earlier ceasefire agreement following an operation in the city against what it called outlaw groups. This was the moment when a presenter on Syria TV had to run and duck for cover after one of the Israeli airstrikes hit a building behind her. The Israeli Defense Minister, Israel Katz, said the Israeli army would continue to attack. That followed days of clashes between Druze forces and Bedouin tribes in the southern province of Sweda, which is close to the Israeli border. Israel, which has many Druze living there and serving in its army, says it's trying to protect the Druze community

and it's blaming the Syrian government for stirring up sectarian violence against the Druze. The US has been urging restraint from both sides. We'll hear from there in a moment. But first, from a surgeon who works in the city of Sweda and sent the BBC this voice note. No one is fine. Civilians, their homes are being shelled randomly and indiscriminately across entire neighbourhoods. Rockets, mortars, even heavy artillery is being used. There

are snipers everywhere. Any movement's dangerous. Roads are closed. We can't even move between buildings. I can't understand the logic behind targeting civilians or looting their homes. This is not the action of a state. This is the behaviour of a gang. Syrians are being targeted simply because they belong to a different sect. The BBC's Lena Sinjab followed the day's events from Beirut. It's a strongest message coming from the Israelis to this newly formed government of Al-Sharah that they will not stop until they withdraw their troops from inside Sweda which is the Druze city to the south of Damascus very close to the border with Israel. For the Israelis they say

they want to protect the Druze but also probably they don't want to see any of the jihadist fighters who are part of the al-Sharah or the new government, the army, to be present inside Sweda or anywhere close to the Israeli border. There has been a deal achieved between the Syrian security forces and the Druze community earlier on but later on the Druze leaders have rejected this deal. We're still waiting to see how things are going to move on. The Syrian government has condemned Israelis attacks on Syrian territories but of course they will not want to engage in any clashes with the Israelis. And what do you think this is really about? Do you think this is mainly about Israel's concern for the Druze or is it also about targeting Syria's military?

Well Israel throughout the years of the war when Assad was in power continued to target sites inside Syria targeting Iranian and Hezbollah fighters and locations but after the fall of Assad, immediately after the fall of Assad, for 48 hours they've hit over 400 military sites, totally crippling the Syrian defense forces. So this is a country that has no defense power. Its army is being formed and it's still weak. Its security forces is being formed and is very weak and really has no interest in opening a battle with a strong army in the region. But I think Israel also wants to make sure that none of the jihadists are reaching anywhere close to its border.

Many of the Druze also are part of the IDF, a part of the forces that come from the occupied Golan Heights. So they want to ensure that anywhere around the buffer zone between Syria and Israel is secure for them. Dina Sinjab. Meanwhile, the US has been trying to calm the situation. Writing on the social media platform X, US Secretary of State Marco Rubio said they'd engaged all the parties involved in the clashes in Syria and have agreed on specific steps that will bring what he called this troubling and horrifying situation to an end. Earlier Mr Rubio was asked about the events at the White House. These are historic long time rivalries between different groups in the south west of Syria,

Bedouins, the Druze community and it led to an unfortunate situation and a misunderstanding it looks like between the Israeli side and the Syrian side. So we've been engaged with them all morning long and all night long with both sides and we think we're on our way towards a real de-escalation and then hopefully get back on track in helping Syria build a country and arriving at a situation there in the Middle East is far more stable. We got the latest from our State Department correspondent, Tom Bateman. I think they believe now that they have got at least commitments for that and that's

potentially why you're hearing about an agreement, at least the Syrian state media is reporting, that Syrian government forces would withdraw from Sueda. That would certainly be, I think, a condition that the Israelis had been demanding. I think the administration was taken a bit unawares by the scale of the Israeli bombardment that has taken place over the last 24 hours or so. And remember the context here is that the Trump administration has been trying to nurture a new relationship with this transitional government led by Ahmed al-Sharah. You know, they have lifted sanctions on the country.

They have delisted Hayat Tadeo al-Sham, the organization that he belonged to as a foreign terrorist organization. They've done a lot to try and sort of embed stability into that country because the Americans are trying to draw or further draw Syria in its new form away from the orbit of Iran and also they want to create this sort of Arab club of Middle East states that the Americans can do business with basically

that's one of the big sort of Trump priorities so they've been trying to do that work and then at the same time they've had the Israelis making a whole series of demands saying that the transitional government has to demilitarise the whole South West, they can't have their forces there. That has escalated into this very dramatic situation over the last few days with these culminating the Israelis bombing Damascus in those extremely dramatic pictures that we have seen. And so the Americans have been caught with this trying to sort of compel their ally the Israelis to stop doing this,

to hold back, although they haven't admitted to their ally, the Israelis, to stop doing this, to hold back, although they haven't admitted to that publicly, but at the same time trying to get some concessions from the government in Damascus as well. Tom Bateman in Washington. The US and Israel-backed group, the Gaza Humanitarian Foundation, that's taken over food distribution in the territory, has given a rare press conference to confirm that 20 people have died at an aid distribution site but it blamed Hamas operatives for causing the violence. As Imogen Folks reports, 19 of the dead were trampled by the crowds as they waited for food. One was reportedly stabbed. A spokesman said the GHF was heartbroken but claimed the deaths were

part of a pattern of attacks by Hamas to undermine the Foundation's work. This is just the latest tragedy linked to the controversial Foundation. The UN Human Rights Office has documented almost 700 deaths, mostly from gunshot wounds, of people trying to get food at GHF sites. Imogen folks, President Trump wants the United States to have what he calls a mostly from gunshot wounds of people trying to get food at GHF sites. Imogen folks, President Trump wants the United States to have what he calls a Golden Dome missile defence shield, a multi-layered defence system intended to detect and destroy foreign threats.

Leading the way in developing the system is the US Space Force, which was set up five years ago and is the newest service in the US military. It's already proved to be crucial in intercepting Iranian ballistic missiles and in helping the US carry out strikes on Iran's nuclear programme. Our defence correspondent Jonathan Beale has this exclusive report. This is a Cape with countdown. In a dark and secure military facility in Colorado, lit up by computers and giant monitors, the countdown to a rocket launch. This is the first time the US Space Force has allowed international media into an operations center for missile warning.

And this is what they're doing every single day, detecting launches, whether fired from Russia, Israel, Yemen, or Iran. Cybers detected a mass volley of five missiles out of Iran. This is America's first line of defense. Launch Yemen! Lieutenant, launch Yemen! Lieutenant Colonel Anne Hughes oversees the operations room. Give two, track one. They are able to track the point of origin as well as the predicted impact location,

so that's the data that they send, or they collect, and then send downrange. No notice, launch Iran! Copy, no launch Iran! This is just a drill. But a few weeks ago, they were doing it for real when Iran fired a salvo of missiles at a US military base in the Middle East. We saw Iran launch against Al Udeid Air Base in Qatar. Ultimately, we saved the entire installation and the personnel that were there.

How did that feel? Heavy. It was absolutely great to make sure that we're safeguarding our U.S. and coalition forces. Outside are these massive, big, what look like golf balls, and they're covering a large radar, which is how the US Space Force talks to their satellites up in the sky. And this is part of what will be America's golden dome,

how they provide missile defence for North America. It's in response to growing concerns about Chinese and Russian hypersonic missiles. This is the Wolf Den. This is the entrance to where we conduct our advanced tactics analysis for space. I'm Colonel Phoenix Hauser, the commander of Space Delta 7. We are Space Force's intelligence and targeting delta. But the US is also worried about their actions in space. We're talking satellites with grappling arms that can pull other satellites out of orbit.

We are already sparring in the cyber domain and the space domain. I think one of our Space Force senior leaders talked about dog fighting in space. That's happening already? I don't know that we're quite there in the type of top gun like dog fighting perspective, but it's something certainly that we need to be ready for. I'm shown a China People's Liberation Army video by Lieutenant General David Miller. So this is what you're up against, you think? You've got to be prepared, if directed, to contend against adversaries like this, should they choose to threaten the U.S. or our allies. Next chart.

We will no longer assume that just good will will ensure that an adversary will not attack us. So to put it very plainly, you are developing offensive weapons for space. I think what we're advocating for is the development and fielding of capability. The only way to deter conflict is through strength. And we have to have our own systems and capabilities

in order to defend those assets. And it has to be made plain to potential adversaries. Are you able to tell us what those options are? I am not. Intelligence expects a launch out of CENTCOM. America's military relies on space for its communications, navigation and precision strikes. Launch from suncom in five minutes.

And its Space Force is stepping up its ability to defend those interests against any adversary. That report by Jonathan Beale. Well, how much would you pay for a 25 kilogram rock from Mars? It's the largest piece of the red planet found so far here on Earth and it's sold at auction in New York. This is your last chance. Try one more. I'll say fair warning then. It's with you, Isabel, and selling for $4,300,000.

So $4,300,000. Congratulations on online. Thank you very much. Well after commission the total price was just under $5.3 million. The reddish brown Martian rock had travelled 225 million kilometres to Earth before it was found by a meteorite hunter in Niger in West Africa in 2023. It had a guide price of between two to four million dollars. So what makes this expensive rock so special? Dr Julia Cartwright is a planetary scientist and cosmochemist at the University of Leicester in Central England. You will have this sort of material being ejected from Mars in a fairly dynamic process, probably a massive asteroid hit with lots of chunks coming out and then those

things are kind of spread out into space and then they the one that we've we've got here has was clearly on a trajectory so it would collide with the earth and it was found in an area where it's quite easy to find things like big rocks which would be somewhere like the Sahara desert. Many of these, because they are found in quite isolated places, are often found by the nomadic people that are living in those areas. So there is a large population of nomadic people who live in the Sahara desert and these materials are found and ultimately brought to areas or to people in more populous areas. And then connections are made and messages are sent

to say, hey, look, we found this, what we think might be a meteorite. And it kind of goes from there really. But meteorites themselves have many different facets. They hold really, really valuable information about the solar system, but are also considered effectively space artifacts. So for this one in particular, with it being fairly large, I mean, it's a fantastic rock if you've seen it. It's huge.

And yes, it would be great if it was in a museum for people to see, if it was part of a scientific collective for analysis to be done. But it is something that is worth quite a lot. Cosmochemist Dr. Julia Cartwright. Still to come. The hackers have disrupted major events across the continent, including the European elections, the peace summit for Ukraine, and most recently the NATO summit

here in the Netherlands. An international police operation has dismantled a group of pro-Russian hackers accused of a wave of high profile attacks targeting critical infrastructure in Europe. President Trump says he's not planning to fire the chairman of the US Federal Reserve, Jerome Powell. The initial reports that Mr. Powell had been forced out sparked a drop in bank stocks and the dollar. Mr. Trump has strongly criticised Mr. Powell, saying he was doing a terrible job for failing to cut interest rates. Michelle Flurry reports from New York. US stocks took a rollercoaster ride after a White House source said Donald Trump was

ready to fire Fed Chair Jerome Powell. But the president later walked back the claim. Donald Trump has repeatedly stopped short of saying he would fire Mr Powell, something he may not even have the legal authority to do. The president said he discussed the idea with lawmakers, continuing his criticism of Mr Powell over the Fed's interest rate policy. Mr Powell's term ends next May and he plans to stay until then. Michelle Fleury. The billionaire owner of Facebook, Mark Zuckerberg, is expected to

testify in a high-stakes trial where he's being sued by his own company shareholders. The case got underway on Wednesday in the US state of Delaware. Shareholders from Meta, the parent company of sites including Facebook, Instagram and the messaging app WhatsApp, are suing him for around $8 billion as payback because of the money Meta has already spent on legal fees over privacy violations by Facebook. I heard more from Lily Jamali, our North America technology correspondent. These shareholders are alleging that Mark Zuckerberg and some other executives, former Chief Operating Officer Sheryl Sandberg, for example, are responsible for these billions

of dollars that you mentioned in costs that they have had to spend to settle privacy violations to basically pay fines in some cases to government agencies that have gone after them for that. And what's interesting too is that they're also suing current and some past members of Metta's board of directors and they're suing these people in their personal capacity. Metta, the company, is actually not a direct party to the suit, but these shareholders are saying that those directors didn't do their jobs, that they protected Mr. Zuckerberg instead of protecting them, the shareholders. Has there been any word from Zuckerberg?

I mean, do we know what his case is? Well, you know, Metta, as I say, has declined to comment. Zuckerberg has not spoken, as far as I know, giving a direct comment on this. But the company has said that they have invested billions of dollars in protecting the privacy of users in recent years. The defendants have called the claims extreme in legal papers, but we are expected to see Mark Zuckerberg and some of these other people including Reed Hastings of Netflix and Mark Andreessen, a

prominent venture capitalist, take the stand in this trial. It's an eight day trial starting today. The judge in the case will ultimately render a decision and Mark Zuckerberg from what we're told is likely to take the stand sometime next week. Lily Jamali, a pro-Russian group blamed for hacks on critical infrastructure across Europe has been dismantled in coordinated action by EU crime agencies in 12 countries. The hackers called No Name 05716 are accused of launching thousands of what's called denial of service attacks which overwhelms individual systems. The hackers targeted arms factories, power suppliers, government agencies and public transport, especially in Ukraine. Anna Hologun reports

from The Hague. The hackers have disrupted major events across the continent, including the European elections, the peace summit for Ukraine, and most recently, the NATO summit here in the Netherlands. As part of the global police operation, more than 100 servers were taken offline and eight suspects, among them the alleged ringleaders based in Russia, were identified. This unprecedented international sweep represents one of the largest actions yet against state-aligned cybercrime networks in Europe.

But investigators warn that with key players out of reach in Russia, the threat may evolve rather than disappear. Anna Holligan. Doctors here in Britain have announced that eight babies have been born using a groundbreaking three-person IVF technique to prevent the children having devastating mitochondrial disease passed from mother to child which starves the body of energy. The technique combines the egg and sperm from the mother and father with a tiny amount of DNA from the egg of a second donor woman. The technique has been legal in the UK for a decade but this is the first proof that it's leading to children being born free of illness caused by defective mitochondria,

the powerhouse of cells. None of the families involved in using the three person IVF technique are speaking publicly, but Kat Kito, whose daughter Poppy was diagnosed with mitochondrial disease 12 years ago when she was just 18 months old, supports its use. It impacts any individual completely differently and any cell can be impacted. So in our daughter it severely affects her. She is unable to use most of her body independently, very life limiting. To realise that eight babies have been born free of mitochondrial disease and those families are able to live a life with children free of pain, discomfort, disease is really, really optimistic and hopeful and it's absolutely not IVF for IVF's sake, it is to eradicate disease for which there is no cure.

And could this I heard more from the BBC's health and science correspondent James Gallaher. This is all about something called mitochondria, which barely anybody has heard of, but they're actually the reason you breathe, because they take oxygen and food and they turn that into the usable energy your body needs to survive. And those mitochondria are in nearly every cell of your body. What happens is they're passed down from mother to child. So if you have very high levels of defective mitochondria in the eggs in your ovaries then all of your children could be affected by mitochondrial disease. So the way scientists have developed a way of overcoming this is to introduce a second

woman who effectively acts as a donor of her healthy mitochondria to the couple that are trying to conceive. And how many people does the mitochondrial disease impact and affect? The figures are around about one in every 5,000 births are affected by mitochondrial disease. I should say that there is a wide range of symptoms. So some people are relatively mildly affected and will survive into adulthood. Some people have different parts of the body who are affected, but in the most extreme cases it can be fatal within days or even hours of birth.

Mason This was also something that was pioneered in Newcastle a decade ago. So why has it taken so long, I guess, for it to be published and become more common knowledge? Gareth There was a big moment a decade ago when Parliament in the United Kingdom voted to become the first country in the world to make this technique legal. Then there was a process of refining the technology to actually make it work in a clinic rather than in a laboratory. And then just as they were getting ready to go, COVID happened, the pandemic happened and that delayed everything. And it's now that they've done the first births

and they've monitored them for long enough to be convinced that they are free of mitochondrial disease. What about, I guess, some of the concerns ethically? There have been some concerns in some countries. The ethics of this are fascinating and different countries around the world for start have different laws around what types of embryo research that you can actually do. So the UK made it legal, only Australia has followed in terms of making it legal. But the ethics of this come down to one of the consequences of the way the eggs and the sperm are manipulated. So

you get about 99.9% of your genetic inheritance from mum and dad as you always would, but you get about 0.1% from the donor because mitochondria have their own DNA which governs how the mitochondria works inside the body. And so you do get that tiny amount of genetic inheritance from the third person. And the way this works, if you have daughters, you will pass that on to them. And if there's a permanent change that's passed down through the generations. How soon can we start seeing the full effects of a child into adulthood as well? And knowing whether this disease is eradicated completely? I can answer that in two ways. One of them is we'll find out when they're like 40 or 50 and

you just kind of have to wait. What's happened so far is they go through quite a rigorous developmental testing. So that takes place at 18 months. It's at age five. So there's still actually a way to go with lots of these eight babies. They do those kinds of tests again. And when you're five, you get a pretty good idea of what's going to happen decades down the line. James Galloway. A team from the luxury fashion house Prada has been meeting shoemakers in the Indian city of Kolhapur after accusations of cultural appropriation. Prada sparked outrage at a fashion show in Milan last month when its models wore Colapur-style sandals without crediting their famous origins. Here's Elec Rene-Smith.

When Prada unveiled what it labelled its latest leather footwear, it looked rather familiar, particularly to the artisans of Colapur, who've been hand-crafting the very same leather footwear for over 800 years. They're so well known that India gave them geographical indication status in 2019. Trade experts called the lack of credit a serious oversize. Indians were outraged. Prada has admitted being inspired by the iconic footwear. It's promised to work to help Kuala Poh sandals gain their rightful global recognition. Eletrone Smith. And finally, how do you make a hot house or greenhouse less hot? Well, that's the challenge facing Kew Gardens, the world-renowned Britannic Gardens in West London. The Palm House, which dates from 1848, and the Waterlily House, which opened four

years later, are to be painstakingly renovated in a project which could take five years. The 65 million dollar project will refurbish the building's iron frame and replace its glass and will also switch to greener heating methods to cut its emissions to net zero. Our Science Editor Rebecca Morrell reports. Q's Palm House is a wonder of the Victorian age. When it opened in 1848, it was the largest glass house ever constructed. But the hot and humid conditions inside, that are essential for the tropical plants it houses, have taken their toll on the building. Its ornate painted metalwork is rusting and 16,000 panes of glass need to be replaced. The renovation will begin

in two years' time, but the horticulturalists at Kew have already started to relocate some of the precious plants, as more than 1,000 species need to be removed and safely stored before work can start. Thomas Pickering is the head of glass houses at Kew. So it's going to be a really, it's going to be a long term project here and over the next two years it's going to be a process of selecting which plants we need to containerize and keep, which ones we need to propagate and also some of the plants will be felling because we won't be able to move them. Q is also taking the opportunity to make the greenhouse much greener,

replacing the gas boilers with huge heat pumps to drastically cut its emissions. That report by Rebecca Morel. And that's it from us for now but there will be a new edition of the Global News Podcast later. If you want to comment on this podcast or the topics covered in it, send us an email. The address is globalpodcast.bbc.co.uk. You can also find us on X at BBC World Service. Use the hashtag globalnewspod. This edition was mixed by Rosamund Dorel, the producers were Liam McSheffrey and Ariane Cochie. The editor is Karen Martin.

I'm Valerie Sanderson, until next time, bye bye.