Growing security chaos | Family infighting with weapons erupts in Al-Raqqa, amid  security service inaction

Al-Raqqa Province: SOHR sources have reported that violent clashes with machineguns erupted today between two families near Al-Qetar street in Al-Raqqah for unknown reasons. However, no casualties have been reported.

The clashes resulted in a state of panic among the residents and caused considerable material damage, while the security forces did not interfere to defuse the disagreement.

On December 10, SOHR activists documented the death of a civilian due to armed clashes between two families in Theban town in eastern Deir Ezzor countryside, following disputes over land ownership, amid security tension in the town and calls by civilians to break up the clashes.
With the alarming proliferation of unlicensed firearms throughout Syria, family and tribal fights have been escalated, leaving large number of casualties every time.

While on November 25, SOHR sources reported clashes with machineguns between two families in the market of Gharanij town in the eastern countryside of Deir Ezzor over an earlier retaliation. The fight resulted in the death of a young man who was not related to any of the two families, after being hit with indiscriminate gunfire, while he was in the market to repair his motorcycle. Meanwhile, tension is growing in the town, amid calls by the residents upon the town’s dignitaries to defuse the tension between the two families. Also, Internal Security Forces were deployed in the town.