Syrian nationalism
[6] Syrian nationalism arose as a modern school of thought in the late 19th century, in conjunction with the Nahda movement, then sweeping the Ottoman-ruled Arab world.
One of the towering historical figures in Syrian nationalism has been the Ayyubid sultan Saladin, the Sunni leader who re-captured Jerusalem and led Muslims to victory against European Crusaders.
Following the Balfour declaration, Sykes-Picot deal and imposition of the French Mandate, Saladin was popularized by nationalists and Islamists as a heroic figure of Syrian resistance against Zionism and Western imperialism.
In contemporary Syria, Saladin is portrayed as a national hero in mass media, Arab TV shows, educational curricula, popular culture, and conservative Muslim circles.
Through his seminal pan-Islamist journal Al-Manar, Rida wrote on a wide range of issues, with topics covering religion, politics, science, technology, and culture.
A strong proponent of Arab unity; Rida criticized the autocratic rule of the Ottoman dynasts and the domination of Turkish nationalist CUP in imperial politics.
He was also a vehement opponent of European colonial powers and urged the Arab people to launch revolutionary action to resist Europe's imperialist plots.
During World War I, Rida issued a fatwa urging Syrians to support the Ottoman empire against Allied colonial powers and simultaneously oppose groups linked to the Young Turks.
[16] As in many other countries of the region, after the fall of the Ottoman Empire, the land now known as Syria was left without a common identity to bond the different ethnicities together.
Already during the period of the Tanzimat, thinkers like Butrus al-Bustani, belonging to the Nahda movement, were claiming the existence of a natural Syrian nation, or Great Syria, also known as the region of the Levant.
After a brief attempt in 1919 to establish an independent Arab Kingdom of Syria under King Faisal, in 1920 the territory was split into three separate regions under the control of France.
[18] After years of conflict and revolts, in 1936 Syria managed to negotiate a treaty of independence from France and became a nation with Hashim al-Atassi as its first president.
[4][21] The Ba'ath party played a major role in offering the Syrian community a new imagined identity that could even connect them to other countries in the Arab world under existent traditions.
[26] A modern-day political movement that advocates the Greater Syria's borders with a pure form of pan-Syrian nationalism is the Syrian Social Nationalist Party (SSNP), founded in 1932 by Antoun Saadeh.
[4] Saadeh, a strong proponent of the irredentist notion of Greater Syria, was an admirer of Adolf Hitler and incorporated Nazi symbolism into his party insignia.
[30] In contrast to the SSNP, the neo-Ba'athist regime from the 1970s limited its territorial claims to Jordan, Lebanon, and the region of Palestine, while shifting from pan-Arabism to "Syro-centric Arabism.
