The violence has pitted the Islamist-led government's security forces against fighters from Assad's Alawite minority. The dead include hundreds of Alawite civilians, whom the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights reported were killed in reprisals after attacks on security forces.

Syria has suffered its worst bloodshed since Bashar al-Assad was toppled from power, with more than 1,000 people reported killed in violence that has swept the coastal region since Thursday.

The killings occurred in the heartland of Syria’s Alawite minority, escalating after a nascent insurgency formed against the Sunni Islamist government.

At least 973 civilians, including women and children, have been killed in Syria in recent days as forces of the new administration seek to crush loyalists of former President Bashar al-Assad, according to the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights (SOHR).

Three days of clashes in Syria have left more than 700 people dead in the worst bout of violence since the Assad regime was ousted last December, according to a war monitoring group.