Opinions

On the first anniversary of the killing of Hassan Nasrallah, the former Secretary-General of Hezbollah, in an Israeli airstrike in Beirut, the party chose to defy a large portion of Lebanese society, challenge the Lebanese government’s decisions, and ignore mediation...

Alia Amina Ahmed Sociologists and psychologists have long studied how disasters and tragedies affect social cohesion. Whether caused by natural events such as earthquakes and volcanic eruptions, or political and social upheavals like wars and conflicts, these major shocks shake...

It was not in vain that Syria’s new ruling authority experienced this contradiction between the form and the essence of the politics it produces. For example, it staged a grand celebration to announce the country’s new “visual identity,” devoting time,...

Societies coming out of wars and authoritarian breakdowns often reconstruct their political discourse through tools of exclusion. In Syria today, this phenomenon manifests in what can be called “ideologized exclusion.” This refers to the creation of systematic narratives designed to...

Syria’s transition under Ahmad al-Sharaa has opened a political vacuum and exposed a fragile state stripped of its former institutions. The collapse of central authority – coupled with simmering sectarian and ethnic tensions – has fuelled outbreaks of communal and...

For decades, under the rule of Hafez al-Assad and then his son Bashar, Syrians suffered from the absence of political and party pluralism, as well as the suppression of diverse and differing opinions. No parties or movements with different orientations...

For decades, Syrians have lived with a deep-rooted problem: hate speech. It did not emerge solely from the war but was fostered through official policies and entrenched social practices. Successive governments used schools, the media and political discourse to depict...

Warnings are mounting within Syrian and international circles about the dangers of hate speech and sectarian polarization on the country’s future, especially in the transitional phase following the fall of former president Bashar al-Assad. Social media platforms have become a...

Since Thursday, Syria’s interim Foreign Minister Asaad al-Shibani has been in Washington for talks with senior officials from the State and Treasury Departments, as well as members of Congress. His agenda includes lobbying for the removal of U.S. sanctions, particularly...

Syrian–Lebanese relations remain stuck at the intersection of a bloody history and the pressing challenges of the present. While Syria’s new leadership has taken steps in recent months to reach out to neighbours – through visits and talks with Iraq,...