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It’s a wait-and-see situation for Syria’s Christians as the country adjusts to the fact that the regime of Bashar al-Assad is no longer. But, based on the experience of recent decades, Christians in the country are not likely to fully embrace the rebel groups who pushed Assad out over the weekend.
“It’s clearly still not known who will lead Syria, but [Abu Mohammad al-Jolani, head of rebel group Hayat Tahrir al Sham, HTS] and his associates are speaking in a language that suggests that perhaps they will not harm Christians and other minorities,” said Asher Kaufman, a Middle East expert at the University of Notre Dame. “But I would be cautious and concerned because of the history of violence against Christians in the Syrian Civil War and the very bad reputation of the Islamic State [and other Islamist groups] over the years during the civil war in the treatment of Christians.”
Kaufman, professor of history and peace studies and the John M. Regan Jr., Director of the Kroc Institute for International Peace Studies in Notre Dame’s Keough School of Global Affairs, noted that Christians were living in relative peace under the Assad regime.
“The Assad family, the Alawite regime — because it was a religious minority itself — made sure that the other religious minorities were protected,” Kaufman said. “But it all changed with the Syrian civil war, and this is when we started seeing, really, the mass emigration of Christians from Syria.”
No clear references
Archimandrite Emanuel Youkhana, a priest in Iraq who runs the humanitarian organization CAPNI, echoed the view that Christians’ hesitation to embrace Syria’s “liberators” is justified, based on recent history.
“The militias now in control are predominantly radical Islamic jihadist groups with no clear political references,” he said in an email to supporters. “They are diverse in ideologies and organizations, united by the single goal of toppling the regime. After achieving this goal, there is no guarantee they will remain unified in decision-making or direction. On the contrary, they are likely to engage in conflicts and fights over influence and control.”
Fr. Youkhana added that among these militias are “armed jihadist elements who are not Syrian but come from Chechnya, Central Asia, and other regions.”
But HTS, which is establishing a transitional government and reconciling with members of the former Syrian regime and the Syrian Arab Army, has given signals that it will not impose strict Islamic law on Syrian society. On December 9 the group announced that it is “strictly forbidden” to interfere in women’s choice of clothing or to demand that women dress modestly, for example.
“HTS emphasized that ‘respect[ing] the rights of individuals is the basis for building a civilized nation,’” the Institute for the Study of War reported. The ISW noted that the group’s “morality police” has previously arrested women for dressing “inappropriately” in areas of Syria it has controlled before.
Time to pray
Kaufman noted that in Syria are “some of the oldest Christian communities in the Middle East.”
There are some Christian communities, he said, such as in Maaloula, where Aramaic is still spoken. Aramaic is the language believed to be what Jesus would have spoken.
For now, perhaps the best that Christians can do is pray for a good outcome. And that is what many did on Sunday, as news emerged that the rebels had succeeded in ousting Assad. During Mass on December 8 at the Shrine of St. Behnam and Sarah in Lebanon, Syriac Catholic Patriarch Ignatius Youssef III Younan offered prayers that “this phase of transition in Syria may be safe and peaceful.”
The Syrian Orthodox Patriarchate, led by Patriarch Mor Ignatios Aphrem II, also issued a statement asking for the gift of “divine wisdom” to find “inspiration, strength and steadfastness in love for the homeland” and reaffirming the Church’s mission to “spread the values of justice, peace, and harmony among all citizens” while respecting Syria’s cultural identity and long history, according to Fides, the information of the Pontifical Mission Societies.
“We call on everyone,” says the communiqué of the Syrian Orthodox Patriarchate, “to play their national role in preserving public and private property and to avoid the use of weapons and the exercise of violence against others.”
The bishops of the Syrian Orthodox Patriarchate also call for “the equality of all social groups and all Syrian citizens, regardless of their ethnic, religious and political affiliation, on the basis of a citizenship that must guarantee the dignity of every citizen.”
And today we celebrate...