1/6/2025 Syria (International Christian Concern) — In a recent announcement on social media, Syria’s Ministry of Education published a series of proposed amendments to the national curriculum that some analysts have criticized as moving the education system toward a more fundamentalist interpretation of Islam.
“After reviewing the amendments,” Syrian journalist Hussam Hammoud said last Wednesday on X, “it’s clear that, aside from removing signs of the criminal Assad regime, the remaining changes have a distinct religious tone.”
Others, pointing out that most of the amendments have yet to be implemented, suggest that the proposals may be more benign.
Among the changes proposed is an update to the phrase “those who have are damned and have gone astray” to instead read “Jews and Christians.” Other updates include language around Islamic morality and the definition of martyrdom, from a nationalist definition created by the previous dictatorship to a religious one.
While online commentators and the media quickly criticized the new religious language, the Ministry of Education downplayed the changes as updates to “misinterpreted” verses of the Quran, implicitly acknowledging that the new language does represent a shift in religious interpretation.
“We have now adopted the correct interpretation,” said Nazir al-Qadri, the country’s interim education minister in a statement posted online, adding that religious language in the curriculum was being amended due to “incorrect information previously adopted by the former Assad regime in the Islamic education curriculum, such as misinterpreting certain Quranic verses.”
Though it remains to be seen which of these proposals will be implemented — according to the ministry, the committee designated to review and approve them has not yet been formed — the announcement is certainly a shift in messaging from the acting government, which has, up to now, worked assiduously to project an image of nationalist rather than Islamist fervor.
Mixed Approach
Syria has long been under U.S.-led sanctions aimed at weakening dictator Bashar al-Assad’s 24-year rule. With Assad deposed as of early December 2024, these sanctions may be reconsidered. However, the acting government is led by the group Hay’at Tahrir al-Sham (HTS) — designated as a foreign terrorist organization by the United States since 2018 after it split from al-Qaida. HTS’s predecessor organization, Jabhat al-Nusra, was similarly designated after its founding in 2011.
Even in this earlier form, HTS has always been primarily focused on opposing the Assad regime — a significant fact as it created an early emphasis on nationalism over jihadism. However, the latter remained in some form. In the years since, the group has heavily emphasized its political aspirations in Syria. Though statements sometimes also hint at the broader aims of a global Islamic caliphate, HTS has, in recent years, instead focused its rhetoric on establishing rule over Syria and expelling pro-Assad Iranian influence from the country.
Ahmed Hussein al-Sharaa, the head of HTS, spent his early years as a militant fighting for the Islamic State group in Iraq. When, after eight years as an Islamic State fighter, he returned to Syria in 2011, it was as a representative of Islamic State founder Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi and his vision of global jihad and a worldwide Islamic caliphate.
Recent Incidents
In recent days, al-Sharaa has worked to project an image of relative tolerance and acceptance for Christians and other religious minorities, including Shiite Muslims.
“Diversity is our strength, not a weakness,” al-Sharaa declared in an edict upon capturing Aleppo en route to Damascus. His appeal appeared to be for a united Syria and a broad-based future for the country. Early reports indicated tolerance for Christian symbols like Christmas trees. However, one was publicly burned in Al-Suqaylabiyah, a Greek Orthodox Christian city near the country’s western coastline, in the days leading up to Christmas.
On Dec. 18, militants fired on a Greek Orthodox church in Hama, located just 31 miles from Al-Suqaylabiyah and one of the largest cities in Syria. The militants reportedly damaged a cross and several headstones in the church compound.
Other anti-Christian incidents have been reported around the country. However, Bishop Andrew Bahhi of St. George’s Syriac Orthodox Church told the media that HTS has responded rapidly to multiple incidents and arrested the perpetrators.
In areas held by HTS in recent years, it allowed a degree of freedom, according to some reports. The group, for example, has permitted smoking and other practices that are prohibited under a more fundamentalist interpretation of Islam. Other sources, though, report that HTS consistently harassed and detained all who were critical of the group or strayed from their religious doctrine, lax as that might be.
Looking Forward
Recent days do not suggest Syria is entering a new period of interfaith tolerance or widespread religious freedom. Reports from the capture of Damascus include incidents of rebels inquiring into the religious identity of residents, suggesting that religion may continue to act as a point of tension.
While al-Sharaa’s immediate focus is to set up a functioning government and is thus motivated to bring as many communities as possible into cooperation, he is still an avowed proponent of the Salafi-jihadist ideology and has much deeper roots as a persecutor of religion than a promoter of its free practice.
As the international community watches to see what type of government will replace the Assad regime, hundreds of thousands of religious minorities in Syria are watching, too. For them, the new government’s respect for religious freedom is an intensely personal unknown. Should al-Sharaa continue to signal support for the rights of Christians and others, that would be a fundamental shift for the better. But that outcome is far from guaranteed, and a reversion to his old ways under Islamic State and al-Qaida would be disastrous for these already vulnerable communities that suffered so much under Assad.
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