SYRIA
and ensuing CIVIL war in the country
Basic facts:
Population: 18,389,000
Capital: Damascus
Area: 185,180 square kilometers (71,498 square miles)
Language: Arabic,
Kurdish, Armenian, Aramaic, Circassian, French, English
Religion: Sunni,
Alawite, Druze and other Muslim sects, Christian
Currency: Syrian
pound
Life Expectancy: 70
GDP per Capita: U.S. $3,700
Literacy Percent: 77
Location and
demography:
In English, the name
"Syria" was formerly synonymous with the Levant (known in Arabic as al-Sham) while the modern state
encompasses the sites of several ancient kingdoms and empires, including the Eblan civilization of the third
millennium BC.
Syria , officially the Syrian
Arab Republic, is a country in Western Asia, bordering Lebanon and the Mediterranean Sea to the West, Turkey to
the north, Iraq to
the east, Jordan to
the south and Israel to
the southwest. A country of fertile plains, high mountains and deserts, it is
home to diverse ethnic and religious groups. It is basically a muslim / Arab
country with 90 percent Muslim population and several ethnic groups. The ethnic
groups include kurds [constituting 9%, living mostly in the north-east corner
of the country, bordering Iraq] Armenians, Assyrians, Turks, Christians, Druze
etc. The Muslim population of country is mostly made up mostly Sunnis (64% of the country population), but the Shiite Alawite
minority (12 percent of Syrians) is politically dominant. The
Alawite-controlled Baath (Renaissance) Party has been ruling country since
1963.
Its
capital city, Damascus, the oldest continuously inhabited city in the world,
was the seat of the Umayyad Caliphate, and a
provincial capital of the Mamluk Sultanate of Egypt.
Brief
History:
Ancient
Syria:
Civilization
of Syria is one of the most ancient on the earth. It was one of the centers
of Neolithic culture
(known as Pre-Pottery Neolithic A) dated
back to 10000BC, where agriculture and cattle breeding
appeared for the first time in the world. During this age, people used
vessels made of stone, gyps and burnt lime. Finings of obsidian tools from Anatolia are
evidences of early trade relations. The following Neolithic period (PPNB) is represented by rectangular houses of Mureybet culture.
Around the excavated city of Ebla near Idlib in northern
Syria, A great Semitic empire spread from the Red Sea north
to Anatolia and east
to Iraq from
2500 to 2400 BC was flourished with Ebla
in northern Syria as its main centre. Gifts from Pharaohs, found
during excavations, confirm Ebla's contact with Egypt.
Modern Syria:
It was
part of the Ottoman Empire for four
centuries. The modern Syrian State was established after the First World War as a French mandate, and represented the largest Arab state to emerge
from the formerly Ottoman-ruled
Arab Levant. Dreams of a "Greater
Syria" were dashed when the smaller states of Lebanon, Palestine, and
Jordan were created by Britain and France in the 1920s. It
gained independence in April 1946, as a parliamentary
republic. The post-independence period was tumultuous, and
a large number of military coups and coup attempts shook the country in the period
1949–1971. Between 1958 and 1961, Syria entered a brief union with Egypt, which was terminated by a military coup. Syria has
fought four wars with Israel—losing the Golan Heights in 1967. Recovering the
Golan has been a matter of fierce national pride for Syrians. Syria was
under Emergency Law from 1963 to 2011, effectively suspending most
constitutional protections for citizens, and its system of government is considered to be non-democratic. Bashar
al-Assad has been
president since 2000 and was preceded by his father Hafez al-Assad, who was
in office from 1970 to 2000. The
30-year rule of Hafez al-Assad was
marked by authoritarian government, an anti-Israeli policy, and military
intervention in Lebanon. Bashar al-Assad
succeeded his father as president in 2000 and continues his father's harsh
policies. He has introduced certain market reforms, but not enough to satisfy
the aspirations of the people.
Syria is a member of United
Nations international organizations- [UN] and Non-Aligned Movement
[NAM]. It is the member of local groupings such as Arab League, the Organization
of Islamic Co-operation [OIC], and
the Union for the Mediterranean.
The mass movement of
revolutions and protests in the Arab world against the un-popular governments
across the Middle East, which is described as “Arab Spring”, by the western Media, has not spared Syria too. The
neo-Ba'athist government has tried to contain the uprising with
iron hand. Part of the government forces are defected into the rebel camps. The
various factions and groups are leading the fight against the government. This
resulted in a civil war in the country. The main rebel groups are “Free Syrian Army” and Al-Nusra Front. These groups, along
with some other factions had formed an umbrella group called “the Syrian National Coalition” in March 2012. In the wake of government’s strong
reaction to the uprising and the killing of people, the Arab League, a group of Muslim Countries, has suspended Syria as
its member and allowed the said membership to the Syrian National Coalition. The latter has been recognized as the "sole representative of the Syrian
people" by several nations including the United States, United Kingdom and
France.
REASONS FOR CIVIL WAR IN SYRIA
The Syrian civil war is an ongoing armed conflict
in Syria between forces loyal to the Syrian Ba'ath Party government and those seeking to oust it. The
conflict began on 15 March 2011, with popular demonstrations that grew
nationwide by April 2011. These demonstrations were part of the wider Middle
Eastern protest movement known as the Arab Spring. Protesters demanded the resignation of President Bashar al-Assad, whose family has held the presidency in Syria
since 1971, as well as the end of Ba'ath Party rule. The chief reasons for the civil war in
the Syria are as follows.
1. Political repression:
President Bashar
al-Assad assumed
power in 2000, after the death of his father Hafez who had ruled Syria since
1970. The power continuous to be concentrated in the ruling family and single
party system has left no channel to vent out political dissent in the
country. Given the history of military
takeovers over the period of time in the country, the popular opinion is that transfer
of power happen only through a military coup or a popular uprising.
2. Discredited ideology:
Syrian Baath party is regarded as the
founder of "Arab socialism",
an ideological current that merged State-led economy with Pan-Arab nationalism.
But, this ideology has proved disastrous
and lost steam in losing wars to Israel and a crippled economy. Upon taking
power, Assad tried to modernize the regime invoking the Chinese model of
economic reform, but time was running against him.
3. Uneven economy
The reforms started
by the Assad regime have opened doors to the private investment in the country,
which created an explosion of consumerism among the urban upper-middle classes.
Further, privatization has favored families with personal links to Assad, but
the provincial Syria suffered raising living costs and severe un-employment.
The lack of employment opportunities, coupled with raise in living costs has
pushed the people to the extreme step of uprising. It is to be noted that the
provinces are the hotbed of uprising, where people suffered the maximum.
4. Drought
To make matters
worse, a persistent drought has devastated farming communities in north-eastern
Syria, affecting more than a million people since 2008. Tens of thousands of
impoverished farmer families were pushed to rapidly expanding urban slums and
their anger doubled due to government apathy, fueled by the display of wealth
of handful of urban elite in the cities.
5. Population growth
The unproductive
public sector and struggling private firms unable to provide employment to the
rapidly growing youth of the country and the disgruntled youth has proved to be
a demographic time bomb waiting to explode. Having got to chance to express
their anger and discontent, majority of them has been participating in the
uprising. It is kind of their response to their un-employment and growing
inequalities in the society.
6. New media
Although the state
media is tightly controlled, the proliferation of satellite TV, mobile phones
and the internet after 2000 has allowed the youth to know the outside world and
started comparing their state of affairs with that of others. The use of
the new
media is critical to the activist networks that underpin the uprising in Syria.
7. Corruption
The rampant
corruption in all walks of life is another reason for popular uprising against
the State. The have not’s have developed
a powerful grievance against the State. It is told that the system is corrupt
to the extent that anti-Assad rebels buy weapons from the government forces,
and families bribe the authorities to release relatives that have been detained
during the uprising. This mirrors the hard realities of the country’s
deteriorated public services.
8. State violence
Syria's vast
intelligence services, the infamous mukhabarat,
penetrate all spheres of society. The fear of the state is
one of the reasons why so many Syrians simply take the regime as a fact of
life. But the outrage over the brutal response of the security
forces to the outbreak
of peaceful protest in spring 2011, documented on social media, helped generate
the snowball effect as thousands across Syria joined the uprising. It is told
that around 80,000 to 1 lakh people are killed in the civil war and killings
had led to more protests.
9. Sectarian
underpinnings:
Syria is a majority Sunni Muslim country but the top
positions in the security apparatus are in the hands of the Alawis, a Shiite religious minority to
which the Assad family belongs. Most Syrians pride themselves on their
tradition of religious tolerance, but many Sunnis still resent the fact that so
much power is monopolized by a handful of Alawite families. While not a driving
force of the Syrian uprising, the combination of a majority Sunni protest
movement and an Alawi-dominated military has added to the tension in
religiously mixed areas, such as the city of Homs.
10. Tunisia effect:
10. Tunisia effect:
The self immolation of a Tunisian
street vendor triggered a wave of anti government protests across the Middle
East, including Syria in late 2010. The fall of regimes in Tunisia and Egypt to
these protests in early 2011, had emboldened people in Syria too, on the hope
that change is possible now, first time in the decades. The live broadcast of events and analysis on
issues on the Al Jazeera TV had also its salutary effect on the Syrian
uprising.
Next issue which is going to be covered is
Why the Middle East countries are called so? Which countries
constitute Middle East?
What is Arab Spring and its effect on the socio-political
environment of the Middle East?
Disclaimer:
The views expressed are that of
the author and not that of the Government.
