Syrian security forces are beginning to move into the restive province of Suwayda after days of communal fighting in which hundreds of people have been killed,the country’s interior ministry says.

Sectarian-tinged clashes left hundreds dead and drew in Israeli military intervention. A U.S. envoy said Israel and Syria had agreed to a truce.

One day after reaching a ceasefire with Israel, Syrian military forces began moving into the country's Suwayda Governorate, where dozens of people have been killed in recent days amid fighting between warring tribes.

Syria’s president declared a ceasefire after nearly a week of sectarian bloodshed in the south, but civilians said there was no let-up in the violence.

Violence between government forces and armed factions of a religious minority in southern Syria this week has deepened divisions in a country still recuperating from a civil war

Once again, images of horrifying violence are pouring out of Syria: dead bodies piled up in a hospital corridor. Gunmen calling out insults as they drive their cars over the corpses of murdered civilians.

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.

The conflict drew airstrikes against Syrian forces by neighboring Israel in defense of the Druze minority before most of the fighting was halted by a truce announced Wednesday.