SAHNAYA, Syria>> Israel said Wednesday that it carried out an attack in Syria on a group targeting members of a minority sect as a new round of clashes left at least 11 people dead, most of them members of the country’s security forces.

The clashes on the edge of the town of Sahnaya, south of the capital Damascus, came a day after a heavy exchange of fire between pro-government gunmen and Druze fighters left 10 people dead in the Damascus suburb of Jaramana.

A statement released by the office of Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said that Israel’s military carried out a warning operation and attacked “an extremist group that was organizing to continue attacking the Druze population” in Sahnaya. It didn’t give details about the warning operation.

The statement said “a serious message was also conveyed to the Syrian regime,” adding that Israel expects it to act to prevent harm to the Druze.

The Syrian Information Ministry said in a statement that 11 members of the country’s security forces were killed in two separate attacks and that others were wounded, triggering the clashes.

The Britain-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights, a war monitor, said that 22 people were killed, of whom 16 were members of the security forces while two were Druze residents of Sahnaya. It added that government forces are sending reinforcements toward Sahnaya. The Israeli military said Wednesday night that three Syrian Druze who were wounded in the fighting were taken to Israel for treatment.

On March 1, Israel’s Defense Ministry said that the military had been instructed to prepare to defend Jaramana, asserting that the minority it has vowed to protect was “under attack” by Syrian forces.

On Wednesday afternoon, a deal was reached between Druze dignitaries and officials representing the government after which security forces and pro-government gunmen entered Sahnaya and the situation became quite after Druze gunmen withdrew from the streets.

The Druze religious sect is a minority group that began as a 10th-century offshoot of Ismailism, a branch of Shiite Islam.