Consequently, despite massive foreign aid, they were never able to defeat the Russians. We have perhaps more accurate estimates on the cost of the spillover into Lebanon. 1 Islam is required to be the religion of the head of state and is the basis of the legal system. Like the Jews, the Alawis consider themselves the “chosen people,” but they are regarded by Orthodox Muslims as heretics. The lack of political participation, fear of public demands, and severe police measures made the regime appear to be a tyranny. As of 2015 , the Syrian economy relies upon inherently unreliable revenue sources such as dwindling customs and income taxes which are heavily bolstered by lines of credit from Iran. They need little on which to survive. Two young Syrians, one a Christian and the other a Sunni Muslim, who were then studying in Paris were both attracted to the grandeur of France and appalled by the weakness of Syria. His choice was confirmed when he learned that America was supplying both up-to-the-minute satellite intelligence to Saddam’s forces and the chemicals with which the Iraqis manufactured poison gas to attack the Iranians. This population growth rate is significantly higher than the year before, which was 0.74%. France was determined, however, to effect its deal with Britain, so in 1920 it invaded and “regime-changed” the Damascus government, making Syria a de facto colony of France but legally, under the League of Nations, a “mandate.” The terms of the League mandate required France to prepare it for independence, but the French showed little intention to do that. Secretary of State John Kerry has claimed that only a portion of the rebels—he thinks about 15 to 25 percent—are what he calls “the bad guys.” But observers on the scene point out that this means there are about 15,000 or 25,000 “bad guys,” and that they are very bad indeed. Four years of devastating drought from 2006 to 2011 turned Syria into a land like the American “dust bowl” of the 1930s. It is a reality that, often years after events occur, we can verify with official papers. All Rights So, during the next two years, what had begun as a food and water issue gradually turned into a political and religious cause. Even at the current horrific rate, that seems unlikely. Other ethnic/religious “nations” (Turkish: ) were self-governing except in military and foreign affairs. Today, and perhaps into the future, something like two-thirds of the country, including its only major earner, the oil and gas industry, is likely to remain in rebel hands or at least not under the control of the central (Damascus-based) government. Above all, disunity had to be overcome. So, he used his military affiliation to energize his party role. At the same time, diplomatic moves were made to reduce tensions. Nusairi) minority, which includes about one in eight Syrians and about a quarter of a million people in both Lebanon and Turkey. . Finally, there is order and the promise of swift justice, delivered according to sharia law by a handful of newly appointed judges. Literacy in Syria is only at 86.4% of the population over 15 years of age, with only 9 years expected to be dedicated to schooling. Terming the situation “a perfect storm,” in November 2008 he warned that Syria faced “social destruction.” He noted that the Syrian minister of agriculture had “stated publicly that [the] economic and social fallout from the drought was ‘beyond our capacity as a country to deal with.’” His appeal fell on deaf ears: the USAID director commented that “we question whether limited USG resources should be directed toward this appeal at this time,” according to a cable obtained by WikiLeaks. As they did, the government attempted to quell them with military force. During the course of the Assad regime, the interpretation of Islam was undergoing a profound change. Overnight the city was engulfed in a vicious, “no-prisoners” insurrection. The most important of these were Damascus, which may be the oldest permanently settled city in the world today, and Aleppo. As we have seen, they have been the major supporters of the rebels. Indeed throughout the French period—in contrast to the relatively laissez-faire rule of the Ottoman Empire—violence was never far below the outward face of French rule. In 19 July 2012 an ongoing military confrontation began in Aleppo, the largest city in Syria, as a part of the Syrian Civil War. Even if fighting dies down, “lasting and bitter war,” like the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan—regardless of what American and European politicians say or even hope—will necessarily involve “boots on the ground.” That is, it will be fought with guerrilla and terrorist tactics on the rebel side against the now-typical counterinsurgency methods on the other side. A rich cultural heritage built over 5,000 years has all but disappeared under the rubble of civil and political chaos. Demographics of Syria 2020. The two Armenian churches suffered damage as a result of the war. The Syrians focus on Syria and seek the overthrow of the Assad regime much as their fathers and grandfathers focused on the task of getting the French out of their country—their watan. Lebanon and Jordan are already precariously balanced, and Israel, opportunistically, will likely use the new situation to advance its already underway policy of driving the Palestinians off the West Bank. And, as we have seen, wars like Iraq have nearly bankrupted the United States. Such covert intervention, and indeed overt intervention, is being justified on two grounds, the first being that the Syrian government is a tyranny. It was inevitable that the native reaction to these intrusions would be first the rise of xenophobia and then the spread of what gradually became a European style of nationalism. In the US war against Iraq, Syria sided with the US against Iraq against in tradition with the rivalry between Baathist leadership in Iraq and Syria. It was the first of a sequence of humiliating attacks that the Syrian armed forces were unable to prevent. Getting rid of chemical weapons will neither in and of itself stop the war nor create conditions favorable to a settlement. Critics of the government complain that, even before the uprising, it contributed to the spread of disease by purposefully restricting access to vaccination, sanitation and access to hygienic water in "areas considered politically unsympathetic". In 2010, the total population of Syria was at approximately 21.4 million inhabitants. The American Congress. Chart and table of population level and growth rate for the Aleppo, Syria metro area from 1950 to 2021. Only some Catholics remained, the group having widely refused to take up arms for the government in Yakubiyah. Another 6.5 million have been displaced within Syria, which before the outbreak of the current conflict was said to have a population of about 22 million. A fundamental problem they faced was what it meant to be a Syrian. If the population were much smaller, Syria could have managed adequately but not, of course, richly. However reprehensible the Syrian government may be in terms of democracy, it has not only given refugees and minorities protection but also maintained the part of Syria that it controls as a secular and religiously ecumenical state. The “Resurrection” (Arabic: Baath) Party had its origins, like the nationalist-communist Vietnamese movement, in France. In 2010, it reached nearly 24 million. This explains why, in 1991, when Iraq invaded Kuwait, Hafez al-Assad sided with the American-led, anti-Saddam coalition. It is now at a stalemate and outside powers may continue to keep it that way. This problem, which is so tragically and bitterly evident in Syria today, found an early expression in the writing of the new constitution in 1973. Islam, in their view, needed to be considered politically not as a religion but as a manifestation of the Arab nation. The conflict drew involvement from a number of international actors and helped precipitate the rise of ISIL (also called ISIS or Islamic State) in eastern Syria. TheAtlantic.com Copyright (c) 2021 by The Atlantic Monthly Group. This is little short of astonishing as they share no common language and come from a wide variety of cultures. Proportional to Syria’s resources, the cost of the war has been immense. Before the civil war Syria had a population of just above 21 million people, according to World Bank data. In 2003, Israel used American aircraft in a strike on a Palestinian refugee camp just outside of Damascus. This has made them impossible to defeat and very difficult to engage in negotiations. This is a very serious charge. Thus, even though it is a small and poor country, Syria is in a sense a focal point of world affairs. These acts of subversion became particularly pronounced during the second Bush administration. 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