Syria's new authorities under interim President Ahmed al-Sharaa have sought to disband armed groups
The Syrian Observatory for Human Rights war monitor has reported that 745 Alawite civilians were killed in Latakia and Tartus provinces.
Syrian authorities said the violence began when remnants loyal to Assad launched a deadly and well-planned attack on their forces on Thursday.
There were no immediate claim of responsibility for the attack.
Sharaa was appointed Wednesday to lead Syria for an unspecified transitional period
No group has claimed the four activists' abduction and they have not been heard from since.
Ankara-backed rebels played a key role in supporting Sharaa's Islamist group Hayat Tahrir al-Sham (HTS), which headed a rebel alliance that seized Damascus on December 8, toppling longtime ruler Bashar al-Assad.
The seismic change in Syria is expected to yield deeper Turkish sway just as a change of US administration is raising questions over how long Washington will keep backing the country's Kurdish-led forces.
Assad fled Syria following a lightning offensive spearheaded by the Islamist Hayat Tahrir al-Sham (HTS), more than 13 years after his crackdown on democracy protests precipitated one of the deadliest wars of the century.
Some 400 people in the besieged Syrian town of Madaya need to be urgently evacuated for medical treatment, says UN humanitarian chief Stephen O'Brien.
An Islamic State militant executes his mother in public in the Syrian city of Raqqa because she encouraged him to leave the group, the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights reports.
The UK's security and intelligence agencies are examining a video by so-called Islamic State, to identify a man and young boy with British accents.
10 alleged members of Islamic State (IS) including a Bangladeshi are killed in coalition force’s air strikes in Syria and Iraq in last one month, according to a list prepared by the US military.
An Islamic State leader with "direct" ties to the alleged mastermind of the Paris attacks is among the 10 of the group's higher-ups killed in Syria and Iraq this month.
If troubled Lebanon, wracked by sectarian violence and religious divides, can champion coexistence and provide Syrian refugees with a chance to study, there is no reason other countries in the region should not follow its example.
The expected evacuation of thousands of rebels from in and around Yarmouk refugee camp in southern Damascus puts on hold, reports say.
Three months after the death of Alan Kurdi, the three-year-old who's body washed up on a beach, his Abdullah bears a Christmas message to the world.
Zahran Alloush, head of the powerful Jaish al-Islam Syrian rebel group, is killed east of Damascus, a monitoring group and Syria's opposition say.
Russia dismisses as "total lies" a report by Amnesty International accusing it of indiscriminate air strikes in Syria.
