Israel said that it was willing to defend Syria's Druze community following days of violence in Syria that a war monitor said led to mass killings of another religious minority.
The violence began last week between fighters linked to Syria's new government and forces loyal to ousted President Bashar al-Assad.
Speaking to reporters, Israeli government spokesperson David Mencer described the violence as a "massacre of civilians" and said that Israel was "prepared, if needed, to defend the Druze", without giving details how.
The Druze are Arabs who practice a religion widely considered as an offshoot of Islam. There are minority Druze communities in Israel, Syria and Lebanon.
Syria's Islamist-led government on Monday said it had completed a military operation against a nascent insurgency. The violence had been centered around coastal provinces where most of Syria's Alawite minority live.
Assad is an Alawite, an offshoot of Shi'ite Islam, whose family for decades ruled over the Sunni Muslim majority.
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