[20kleagues]

I would love to hear what the Syrian hacker news community has to say about this. I’m reading so many comments here but not sure how many are from actual Syrians who probably have a deeper understanding and hope/fears about what comes next.

[account266928]

Made an account for this. Like another commenter said, you certainly won't get a cross section of "Syrians" here, and even I as a diaspora born in America to Syrian Christian parents can only loosely proxy the "Syrian Response." It's split -- some relatives and family friends have hated Assad for ages before the war (e.g. someone they knew was "arrested", they got property essentially taken from them, etc.)

Overall, though, there's a lot of fear. Just recently family of mine were going to visit for medical/humanitarian reasons, but now won't any time soon. We all know people there who've been struggling economically for years with the sanctions, but there's a different feel when this sort of ambiguous future violence looms. I'd disagree with other commenters stereotyping "most Syrians are celebrating", it does vary with a spectrum of wanting "stability" and wanting "freedom". farkanoid's stuff about torture and the mukhabaraat (never seen that mentioned in English!), can somewhat confirm, but am personally further away from that since I haven't been to Syria since the war started. The most definitive thing to say is the variance in Sryians' responses is not completely explained by their ethnicity or religion, and that just like any political people, their feelings come less from geopolitical simulations and staring at battle maps, more from their history and connections.

I'm not qualified to give predictions. I mostly wrote this comment to demonstrate that there are sort of Syrians on this website, not to give detailed political analysis. And finally, the sample you see here ARE sort of the "elite" that aprilthird2021 mentioned -- my people are Christian doctors, and farkanoid's Alawite relatives I'm guessing are more well off than the median.

[someotherperson]

“Actual Syrians” isn’t a thing for this — it’s like wanting to hear from ‘actual Americans’ what they thought of the US election.

Depending on the ethnicity, religion and politics of those Syrians you’ll get wildly different views.

[20kleagues]

And those different (or similar) views are what would be important and what I would be interested to read. Because the views of the people from that land are what matter the most during these events.

[aguaviva]

Wrong-o, man.

Talking to actual people is the magical, indispendible ingredient you need in your analysis.

Of course they're quite often biased. That's not the point. But at least you get a human perspective. And even when they're biased, it turns out that "actual people" are usually far less intellectualized and rigidly ideological than the stuff you'll read online. And when they do have an axe to grind, usually there's at least a story behind it ("my family went through this") that you can at least incorporate into your dataset.

And the more actual people you talk to, the more you get to triangulate. Plus, they sometimes invite you into their house for really awesome food.

But if all one does is soak up online narratives and analysis (and worst off all, the crap that thinktanks typically put out, even when they're mostly on the right side) -- one basically becomes a language model.

Full of facts, but knowing nothing.

[j_maffe]

Most Syrians I know are celebrating. I could have a biased demographic tho.

[CuriousCosmic]

Statistically most would be. Assad's regime were Shiites (~13% of the population) and the HTS are Sunni (74% of the population).

This doesn't necessarily mean they are better but at the very least of two very theistic groups, the latter better represents the population than the former.

And of course while this means Russia and Assad are finally out of the equation, the governments in North and East Syria aren't exactly stoked about the HTS' explosive growth in power.

[philistine]

Even if the situation get worse, there is definitely cause to celebrate one less player on the very complicated board that is the civil war.

[yetanother-1]

Syrian here, born, raised, and finished my studies in Syrian.

Been to many countries like UAE, Saudi, and finally Germany.

I can tell that the joy is immense. Most druze and alawite are not too happy and fearing, mainly because of the feare built into them throughtout the war years.

Incertanitiy is very big, but the joy of seeing a north-korean-like system collapse in few days is unimaginable.

I have seen too many nk documentaries, I can say that it applies 100% to Syria, with many many more complexities in the region.

AMA

Happy to give proof to mods.

[farkanoid]

Honestly, my Sunni relatives from Tartus, Homs and Dimashq are elated. My alawite and druz relatives from Tartus and Latakia are almost distraught.

There is a massive disparity between the treatment of Alawites/Shiites/Druz and Sunnis in Syria (Re: employment opportunities, etc)

I've always heard horror stories about starvation and torture from my father (Sunni) who served over a decade in Hafiz Assads military, as well as constant fear of the "Mukhabaraat" (government informants), leading to huge amounts of self-censorship when speaking on the phone or in public.

My alawite/druz relatives are generally well off and would tell me "eh, it wasn't so bad", despite having the same informant fears and self-censoring

[everybodyknows]

How common is intermarriage between the various sects?

[farkanoid]

It's not uncommon in Tartus, but far less common in Homs and Dimashq. Oddly enough it's usually Sunni husband and 'x' wife.

For example we have Sunni/Shia, Sunni/Druz, Sunni/Christian and most recently Sunni/Alawite in our extended family, all from Tartus.

Our relatives from Homs/Dimashq are almost exclusively Sunni, religious, and tend to marry from their own sect and even city.

There are irreconcilable differences between (for example) Sunnis and Shiites that would usually prevent marriage if the husband is 'stricter' in faith, not to mention the rift caused during family gatherings by the politics behind each sect (ie: Alawites are generally pro-Assad, Shiites are usually pro Hezbollah, Sunnis are usually against both)

Edit: This is obviously a gross oversimplification, basically less religeous more intermixing.

[aprilthird2021]

Most Syrians don't speak English and aren't here. Only a very small elite of Syrians will ever really be accessible to you. But even that perspective can be valuabl

[lm28469]

That's your daily reminder that HN is a bubble in a bubble