Educate
Provide context, history, stories, and resources that help people understand Syria and the experiences of its people.
FREE SYRIANS
أحرار سوريا
WHO WE ARE
A platform to educate, advocate, and connect.
Free Syrians brings together information, stories, resources, and community connections for Syrians and friends of Syria around the world. We seek to deepen understanding, amplify Syrian voices, defend freedom and human dignity, and help people connect around a shared hope for Syria’s future.
Advocate
Stand for the rights, freedom, dignity, and meaningful participation of Syrians at home and throughout the diaspora.
Connect
Bring together Syrians, communities, supporters, initiatives, and organizations that want to contribute to a better future.
OUR MISSION
Freedom, dignity, justice, and a better future for Syria.
Free Syrians is an independent platform dedicated to Syrians who believe in freedom, dignity, justice, and a better future for Syria.
Our mission is to preserve the voices, stories, history, and aspirations of Syrians while creating a space that connects people across generations and around the world.
We believe Syria belongs to all its people. A future Syria should respect human dignity, protect individual rights, value its diversity, and allow every Syrian to participate freely in shaping the country’s future.
Free Syrians aims to inform, document, remember, connect, and contribute to that future.
SYRIA
A country of deep history, diverse communities, and a future still being written.
Syria is more than the conflicts that have defined recent headlines. It is a country shaped by ancient civilizations, historic cities, rich traditions, many communities, and generations of Syrians whose lives and stories extend far beyond politics and war.
This section will grow into a living guide to Syria: its history, cities, culture, people, modern experience, displacement and diaspora, and the ideas shaping its future.
Our goal is to help Syrians and non-Syrians understand the country in its full depth — remembering what was lost, preserving what remains, and looking toward what can still be built.
Explore Syria
Damascus
Syria’s capital and one of the world’s oldest continuously inhabited cities, shaped by centuries of history, faith, trade, architecture, and culture.
Homs
A major city in central Syria with deep historical roots and an important place in the country’s social, cultural, and modern story.
Hama
A historic city on the Orontes River, widely known for its great wooden waterwheels and a distinctive cultural heritage.
Aleppo
An ancient northern city shaped by trade, diverse communities, historic markets, and the monumental Citadel at the heart of its old city.
Idlib
A northwestern region known for its towns, countryside, olive groves, archaeological heritage, and communities with stories that deserve to be preserved.
MODERN SYRIAN HISTORY
From Assad family rule to revolution, December 8, and Syria’s transition.
Syria’s recent history can be understood through several major periods. This timeline gives visitors the basic sequence before we expand each period with documents, photographs, testimony, and sources.
Hafez al-Assad
Hafez al-Assad took power in 1970 and ruled Syria until his death in 2000, building a highly centralized political and security system.
Bashar al-Assad
Bashar al-Assad succeeded his father in 2000. Expectations of political opening faded as the state remained dominated by centralized rule and powerful security institutions.
Uprising, war, and displacement
Protests calling for political change spread across Syria in 2011 and were met by arrests and violence from security forces. The uprising developed into a devastating war involving Syrian factions and foreign powers, killing hundreds of thousands and displacing millions.
The Assad government falls
Opposition forces entered Damascus and Bashar al-Assad fled Syria, ending more than five decades of Assad family rule. For many Syrians who opposed the government, December 8 became a symbol of liberation after years of revolution, imprisonment, displacement, and loss.
Transition and rebuilding
Under President Ahmed al-Sharaa, Syria is rebuilding institutions and international relationships while confronting security, accountability, missing persons, displaced communities, reconstruction, national unity, and the country’s political future.
This section will grow chronologically and with sources so visitors can distinguish documented history, testimony, interpretation, and continuing developments.
STORIES
Every Syrian story is part of Syria’s story.
History is not only written through governments, battles, and major events. It also lives in families, neighborhoods, classrooms, workplaces, journeys, traditions, friendships, losses, and new beginnings.
Stories will become a home for personal memories, eyewitness accounts, family histories, photographs, reflections, and experiences from Syrians inside the country and throughout the diaspora.
By preserving individual voices, we can help future generations understand not only what happened to Syria, but how Syrians lived through it, remembered it, rebuilt their lives, and continued to carry Syria with them wherever they went.
EVENTS
Gatherings that connect Syrians, communities, and generations.
Events will highlight upcoming gatherings connected to Syria and Syrian communities around the world, including cultural celebrations, commemorations, public talks, exhibitions, community meetings, educational programs, and other meaningful occasions.
We want this section to make it easier for Syrians and friends of Syria to discover opportunities to meet, learn, remember, celebrate, and participate.
As the site grows, events can include dates, locations, registration details, photographs, and recaps of past gatherings.
MEDIA WATCH
Claims deserve evidence. Corrections deserve visibility.
Media Watch will examine public reports, headlines, social-media posts, and allegations about Syria where information may be false, misleading, incomplete, unsupported, or disputed.
Our goal is not to reject criticism or label a report false simply because we disagree with it. Each case should clearly identify the original claim, who published it and when, the evidence reviewed, what can be independently verified, what remains disputed or unsupported, and any correction or additional context.
Where appropriate, documented concerns can also be directed through a publisher’s correction process or relevant professional and regulatory channels. The standard is simple: preserve the original record, show the evidence, cite the sources, and let readers see how the conclusion was reached.
RESOURCES
Useful places to learn, document, connect, and find support.
Resources will bring together carefully selected links and references related to Syria, Syrian history and culture, community organizations, documentation projects, educational material, humanitarian support, and diaspora services.
The goal is not to create a long directory of links, but a useful and trusted starting point. As this section grows, resources can be organized by topic so visitors can quickly find what is relevant to them.
We will review and expand these resources over time, including valuable material from the original FreeSyrians.ca website where it still serves visitors well.
CONTACT
Connect with Free Syrians.
Free Syrians welcomes messages from people who want to contribute a story, share an event, suggest a resource, provide a correction, collaborate on a project, or help strengthen this platform.
This section will become the central point for general inquiries and community contributions. We will add the final contact method and submission options once the site structure is complete.