Episode 2778
Syria
Tue, 2024-Dec-10 01:44 UTC
Length - 5:12
Direct Link
Welcome to Popular Wiki of the Day, spotlighting Wikipedia's most visited pages, giving you a peek into what the world is curious about today.
With 546,113 views on Monday, 9 December 2024 our article of the day is Syria.
Syria is a country in West Asia located in the Eastern Mediterranean and the Levant. It is bounded by the Mediterranean Sea to the west, Turkey to the north, Iraq to the east and southeast, Jordan to the south, and Israel and Lebanon to the southwest. It is under a transitional government and comprises 14 governorates. Damascus is the capital and largest city. With a population of 25 million across an area of 185,180 square kilometres (71,500 sq mi), it is the 57th most populous and 87th largest country.
The name "Syria" historically referred to a wider region, broadly synonymous with the Levant and known in Arabic as al-Sham. The modern state encompasses the sites of several ancient kingdoms and empires, including the Eblan civilization of the 3rd millennium BC. Damascus and Aleppo are cities of great cultural significance. Damascus was the seat of the Umayyad Caliphate and a provincial capital for the Mamluk Sultanate in Egypt. The modern Syrian state was established in the mid-20th century after centuries of Ottoman rule, as a French Mandate. The state represented the largest Arab state to emerge from the formerly Ottoman-ruled Syrian provinces. It gained de jure independence as a parliamentary republic in 1945 when the First Syrian Republic became a founding member of the United Nations, an act which legally ended the French Mandate. French troops withdrew in April 1946, granting the nation de facto independence.
The post-independence period was tumultuous, with multiple military coup attempts shaking the country between 1949 and 1971. In 1958, Syria entered a brief union with Egypt, which was terminated in the 1961 coup d'état and was renamed as the Syrian Arab Republic in constitutional referendum. The 1963 coup d'état carried out by the military committee of the Ba'ath Party established a one-party state and ran Syria under emergency law from 1963 to 2011, effectively suspending constitutional protections for citizens. Internal power-struggles within Ba'athist factions caused further coups in 1966 and 1970, which eventually resulted in the seizure of power by Hafiz al-Assad. He effectively established an Alawite minority rule to consolidate power within his family. After Assad's death, his son Bashar al-Assad inherited the presidency in 2000.
Since the Arab Spring in 2011, Syria has been embroiled in a multi-sided civil war with involvement of different countries, leading to a refugee crisis where more than 6 million refugees were displaced from the country. The Islamic State (IS) militant group captured many Syrian cities in 2014–15, in response to which the United States launched an international coalition that territorially defeated IS in Syria. Thereafter, three political entities – the Syrian Interim Government, Syrian Salvation Government, and Rojava – emerged in Syrian territory to challenge Assad's rule. In late 2024, a series of offensives from a coalition of opposition forces led to the capture of several major cities, including Damascus, and the fall of Assad's regime.
A country of fertile plains, high mountains, and deserts, Syria is home to diverse ethnic and religious groups. Arabs are the largest ethnic group, and Sunni Muslims are the largest religious group. Up until the capture of Damascus by rebel forces, it was the only country governed by neo-Ba'athists. The neo-Ba'athist government was a totalitarian dictatorship with a comprehensive cult of personality around the Assad family and attracted widespread criticism for its severe domestic repression and war crimes. Being ranked 4th worst in the 2024 Fragile States Index, Syria is one of the most dangerous places for journalists. Freedom of the press is extremely limited, and the country is ranked 2nd worst in the 2024 World Press Freedom Index. It is the most corrupt country in the MENA region and was ranked the 2nd lowest globally on the 2023 Corruption Perceptions Index. Syria has also become the epicentre of an Assad-sponsored Captagon industry, exporting billions of dollars worth of the illicit drug annually, making it one of the largest drug cartels in the world.
This recording reflects the Wikipedia text as of 01:44 UTC on Tuesday, 10 December 2024.
For the full current version of the article, see Syria on Wikipedia.
This podcast uses content from Wikipedia under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike License.
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Until next time, I'm generative Ruth.
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