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Rumours and Exaggerations
Living in Syria this year has certainly opened my family up to a lot of stress, mainly due to the current upheaval of Middle Eastern governments in a bid for democracy.
Syria’s modern history is very much like the surrounding Middle Eastern countries where they have a facade democracy that’s been put in place for a long time and people are used to it. When Bashar Al-Assad’s father died at the start of the 21st century he left the presidency to his son. At this time Syria wasn’t a very modern place with almost no access to the internet and an economy that was starved of growth due to the lack of economic freedom. People used to have to travel all the way to Beirut in Lebanon to properly go shopping for stylish clothes or the latest gadgets. This all changed however when Bashar came into power, bringing economic and social reforms that made Syria bloom into an economically stable country by Middle Eastern standards.
Currently, due to the many calls for change in the Middle East, Syria is under threat by some people in opposition to the government with many small protests popping up all over the place. Most of these protests are not as people would think: a call for proper democracy, but instead a call for Bashar and his government to make more social and economic changes in Syria and to cut out corruption amongst officials.
However, there have been several large protests in the border town of Deraa. In talking to many different Syrians in this matter I have been able to see a wide variety of ideas and facts as to why this is.
Firstly Deraa is a border town, meaning that it’s very much open to outside influence, weapons are easily smuggled in and people can come across and create trouble there. Also, Syria has a variety of cultures and they don’t all get on, so one thing I’ve been told is that Deraa is filled with the people from a culture that doesn’t like Bashar’s ideologies. Another thing I have been told is that when Bashar came to power in 2000 he was challenged for the presidency by a close relative and the people in Deraa are the ones who think Bashar shouldn’t have come to power.
All in all what I’ve learnt is that most people love Bashar Al-Assad and Deraa is just a thorn in the side of what is otherwise a peaceful nation. Today is Friday and at 1pm when people come out from Friday prayers I might be proven wrong, but for the moment things look stable and I think they will continue to be so.
As for dangers to Westerners: if you don’t get involved and stay away from any protests then nothing is going to happen to you. Simple.
