Syria’s interim leader has appealed for unity, as violence and revenge killings continued in areas loyal to ousted former leader Bashar al-Assad on Sunday.

Hundreds of people have reportedly fled their homes in the coastal provinces of Latakia and Tartus – strongholds of Assad support.

Local residents have described scenes of looting and mass killings, including of children.

In Hai Al Kusour, a predominantly Alawite neighbourhood in the coastal city of Banias, residents say the streets are filled with scattered bodies, piled up and covered in blood. Men of different ages were shot dead there, witnesses said.

People were too scared to even look out of their windows on Friday. The internet connection is unstable, but when connected they learned of their neighbours’ deaths from Facebook posts.

One man, Ayman Fares, told the BBC he was saved by his recent imprisonment. He had posted a video on his Facebook account in August 2023 criticising Bashar al-Assad for his corrupt rule. He was arrested soon after, and only released when Islamist-led forces freed prisoners after Assad’s fall last December.

The fighters who raided the streets of Hai Al Kusour recognised him, so he was spared death but not the looting. They took his cars and continued to raid other houses.

“They were strangers, I can’t identify their identity or language, but they seemed to be Uzbek or Chechen,” Mr Fares told me by phone.

“There were also some Syrians with them but not from the official security. Some civilians also were among those who carried out the killing,” he added.

Mr Fares said he saw families killed in their own homes, and women and children covered in blood. Some families ran to their rooftops to hide but were not spared the bloodshed. “It is horrific,” he said.

The UK-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights documented more than 740 civilians killed in the coastal cities of Latakia, Jableh and Banias. A further 300 members of the security forces and remnants of the Assad regime are reported to have died in clashes.

The BBC has not been able to independently verify the death toll.

Mr Fares said things stabilised when the Syrian army and security forces arrived in the city of Banias. They pushed other factions out of the city and provided corridors for families to access safe areas, he said.

Ali, another resident of Banias who asked us not to use his full name, corroborated Mr Fares’ account. Ali, who lived in Kusour with his wife and 14-year-old daughter, fled his home with the assistance of security forces.

“They came to our building. We were too scared just listening to the fire and screams of people in the neighbourhood. We learned about the deaths from sporadic Facebook posts when we managed to connect. But when they came to our building, we thought we are done,” he said.

“They were after money. They knocked on our neighbour’s door taking his car, his money and all the gold or valuables he had in his home. But he was not killed.”

Ali and his family were picked up by his Sunni neighbours, who follow a different branch of Islam, and are now staying with them. “We lived together for years, Alawites, Sunnis and Christians. We never experienced this,” he told me.

“The Sunnis rushed to protect Alawites from the killing that happened and now the official forces are in town to restore order.”

Ali said families were taken to a school in a neighbourhood that is predominantly Sunni, where they will be protected until members of the factions that carried out the killings are ousted from Banias.

The violence started on Thursday after Assad loyalists – who refused to give up arms – ambushed security forces around the coastal cities of Latakia and Jableh, killing dozens of them.

Ghiath Dallah, an ex-brigadier general in Assad’s army, has announced a new rebellion against the current government, saying he was establishing the “Military Council for the Liberation of Syria”.

Some reports suggest that former security officers of the Assad regime who refused to give up arms are forming a resistance group in the mountains.

Mr Fares said most of the Alawite community reject them and blame Dallah and other hardline Assad loyalists for the violence.

“They benefit from the bloodshed that’s happening. What we need now is official security to prevail and to prosecute the killers from the factions who did the mass killing so the country restores safety,” he said.

But others also blame interim president Ahmad al-Sharaa, saying he dismantled Syria’s security, army and police establishments with no clear strategy for dealing with thousands of officers and personnel left unemployed.

Some of these individuals, especially among the police, had nothing to do with the killing during Assad’s regime. The new authorities also dismissed thousands of public employees from their work.

With 90% of Syria’s population living below the poverty line and thousands left without an income, it’s fertile ground for a rebellion.

There is a split in views in Syria over what is happening. The wider community condemns the killing of any civilians and demonstrations have been organised in Damascus to mourn the deaths and condemn the violence.

But over the past two days, there were also calls for “Jihad” in different parts of Syria. Residents in Banias said that along with the factions, there were some civilians who were armed and joined forces in the killing.

Syria’s majority Sunnis have faced atrocities at the hands of the Assad regime’s forces over the past 13 years. This fuelled sectarian hatred mainly towards the Alawite minority, where members of the community are affiliated with war crimes.

According to human rights groups, there is evidence that Alawite security officers were involved in the killing and torture of thousands of Syrians, the majority of which are Sunni Muslims, during the Assad regime.

Those members of the army and security forces who were killed are mostly from the Sunni community and now some in the Sunni community are calling for retaliation, but the president has called for calm.

Sharaa, whose Islamist forces toppled Assad three months ago, must now balance providing safety for all with pursuing justice for the crimes of the Assad regime and its henchmen.

While he has authority over some of the troops who helped him to power, some factions are clearly out of his control. Those factions also include foreign fighters with a radical Islamist agenda.

To lead Syria into a safe and democratic future, many argue Sharaa needs to end the presence of any foreign fighters and deliver a constitution that protects the rights of all Syrians, regardless of their background or religion.

While he is seen to be working towards the legal framework for such a constitution, controlling the violent factions and expelling foreign fighters will prove a major challenge.