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Sectarianism in the Syrian context refers to political mobilisation along religious community lines — Sunni, Alawite, Druze, Christian, Shia — and to the use of communal identity as a resource for political competition and conflict. Syria’s diverse religious landscape (Sunni Arab majority of approximately 70%, Alawite 10–12%, Christian 10%, Druze 3%, with smaller communities) has made sectarian politics both a persistent risk and a consistently exploited political tool. The French MandateFrench Mandate The League of Nations mandate over Syria and Lebanon administered by France from 1920 to 1946. The Mandate created the modern borders of Syria and Lebanon, pursued a…
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The Corrective MovementCorrective Movement The bloodless coup of 13 November 1970 in which Hafez al-Assad seized power in Syria, removing the Jadid government and becoming Prime Minister, then President. Assad described it as a ‘corrective movement’ within Ba’athism rather than a coup. By 1970, Hafez al-Assad had been manoeuvring against the radical Ba’athist Salah Jadid for several years. The two men represented genuinely different visions: Jadid was an ideological Ba’athist who prioritised party organisation and socialist transformation; Assad was a pragmatist who believed power resided in military force and was uninterested in ideological purity. The 1967 war, in which Syria…
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The United Arab RepublicUnited Arab Republic united-arab-republic The political union of Egypt and Syria formed in February 1958 under Nasser’s leadership, the most ambitious attempt to realise pan-Arab unification. It lasted three and a half years before the Syrian army ended it in September 1961. The United Arab Republic was formed when the Syrian Ba’ath Party and army, fearful of communist influence in Syria and inspired by Nasserist pan-Arabism, approached Egypt in late 1957 proposing union. Nasser accepted on his own terms: full political merger rather than federation, with Egypt dominant and no independent Syrian parties. The UAR’s constitution created…
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The troupes spéciales du Levant (Special Troops of the Levant) were local auxiliary military forces established by the French MandateFrench Mandate The League of Nations mandate over Syria and Lebanon administered by France from 1920 to 1946. The Mandate created the modern borders of Syria and Lebanon, pursued a policy of divide and rule along religious and ethnic lines, and produced the political and institutional structures that shaped Syrian and Lebanese politics for the rest of the century. France had claimed a sphere of influence in Greater Syria — covering modern Syria, Lebanon, Jordan, and Israel-Palestine — since the Sykes-Picot…
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The Golan HeightsGolan Heights The strategic plateau on Syria’s southwestern border, captured by Israel during the 1967 Six-Day War. Israel extended its law there in 1981 — a move the international community considered annexation — and the United States recognised Israeli sovereignty in 2019. The Golan’s unresolved status was a central issue of Syrian foreign policy under both Assads. The Golan Heights — a basalt plateau rising from the Sea of Galilee to Mount Hermon — was captured by Israel in the last days of the June 1967 war in a military advance that covered approximately 1,200 square kilometres. The…
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The Republican Guard (Al-Haras al-Jumhuri) is an elite Syrian military formation whose primary purpose has been the protection of the Assad regime rather than conventional battlefield effectiveness. Heavily Alawite in its officer corps and better paid and equipped than the regular Syrian Arab Army, the Republican Guard was positioned around Damascus and the presidential palace complex. Its institutional loyalty was to the Assad family rather than to any formal military hierarchy. Under Bashar al-Assad, the Fourth Armoured Division — commanded by his brother Maher al-Assad — absorbed much of the praetorian function that earlier formations had served. The existence of…
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The Axis of Resistance (Mihwar al-Muqawama) is the informal alignment of states and non-state actors that defines itself in opposition to Israeli and American influence in the Middle East. Its core members are Iran, Syria (under the Assads), HezbollahHezbollah hezbollah The Lebanese Shia political party and military organisation, created by Iran’s Revolutionary Guards in the Bekaa Valley from 1982, which became the most powerful non-state military force in the Middle East. It drove Israeli forces out of southern Lebanon in 2000, fought Israel to a stalemate in 2006, and served as Iran’s primary regional proxy. Hezbollah — the Party of…
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Jabhat al-NusraJabhat al-Nusra jabhat-al-nusra Al-Qaeda’s official Syrian franchise, dispatched into Syria in 2011 by Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi. Under its leader Abu Muhammad al-Julani it became the most effective jihadist force in the Syrian opposition before its eventual break with Al-Qaeda and transformation into Hayat Tahrir al-Sham. Jabhat al-Nusra — the Support Front for the People of Greater Syria — was established in late 2011 by Julani, who had been sent from Iraq with a small group of fighters and seed funding by ISIS’s precursor organisation. It distinguished itself from other armed opposition groups by military effectiveness, discipline, and the implementation…
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Daesh is the Arabic acronym for al-Dawla al-Islamiyya fi al-Iraq wa al-Sham (the Islamic StateIslamic State islamic-state The jihadist organisation that declared a caliphate spanning Iraq and Syria in June 2014 under Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi, also known as ISIS, ISIL, or Daesh. At its peak it governed eight million people, conducted terrorist attacks worldwide, and committed genocide against the Yazidi people. The Islamic State evolved from Al-Qaeda in Iraq, founded by Abu Musab al-Zarqawi, which had embedded itself in the Sunni insurgency against the American occupation. Zarqawi’s particular contribution was the deliberate targeting of Shia Muslims as apostates — a…
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The Free Syrian ArmyFree Syrian Army The armed opposition umbrella formed in July 2011 from defecting Syrian Arab Army officers and soldiers, which became the internationally recognised face of the anti-Assad armed opposition. It never functioned as a unified organisation and progressively fragmented. The Free Syrian Army was announced in a video broadcast from Turkey in July 2011 by Colonel Riad al-As’ad, a defecting Syrian Air Force officer. It claimed to represent the armed wing of the Syrian opposition, but from its inception it was less an organisation than a brand: individual armed groups adopted the FSA flag and name…
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Category: Glossary
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