Christians in historic town in Syria reflect on new moment in the country

Earlier this week, US President Donald Trump met with Syrian President Ahmad al-Sharaa in Saudi Arabia and announced plans to ease sanctions on the war-torn country. 

Trump said that the opinions of Saudi Arabian Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman and Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan were big factors in his decision to lift sanctions on Syria.

“President Erdoğan called me and said, ‘Is there any way you could do that? Because if you don’t do that, they don’t have a chance,’” Trump said. “So, I did it.”

The presidents’ meeting followed renewed violence within Syria. In the past few months, clashes between pro-government forces and members of the Druze community and between Sunni gunmen and Alawites have left more than 1,100 people dead.   

Members of Syria’s many ethnic and religious minorities are on edge about the future under an Islamist government with an ultraconservative past. Some people in Maaloula, long a stronghold for Christianity in Syria, shared with The World their concerns and hopes for the future under the new government.

‘He should bring everyone together’

Youstina Khoury, 41, a nun at the Greek Orthodox Saint Takla convent in Maaloula, said that she remembers when the opposition group Jabhat al-Nusra took over Maaloula in 2013.

Most of the residents fled.

Khoury said that she and 11 other nuns were abducted by the group and held in a nearby town for 100 days.

She said that the kidnappers weren’t violent toward them.

After 100 days, the rebels agreed to exchange the nuns for a group of prisoners held in Assad prisons.

Khoury spoke carefully because the group’s leader, Sharaa, took power after his Islamist group, Hayat Tahrir al-Sham (HTS), led an offensive that toppled former President Bashar al-Assad in December after more than a decade of fighting. 

Assad, a member of Syria’s Alawite minority, ruled for more than two decades.

Khoury said that as disturbing as the experience was, she has put the past behind her.

“What happened is all God’s will,” Khoury said, adding, “We have to accept it.”

She compared the new president to the head of a household.

“He should bring everyone together,” she said. “I pray for his success.”

Aramaic ‘should be kept alive’

But not everyone in Maaloula is as accepting of the country’s new leadership.

Taala Saleem Reyhan, 60, said that she is fearful about what is in store. 

“Everyone is scared. Muslims, Christians and the Druze. They’re all scared of what comes next,” she said. 

Sixty-nine-year-old George Zaarour echoed that, stressing that the president “comes from a very conservative background. It’s different from the Sunnis living in Damascus who are more open-minded.”  

Still, he hopes that Sharaa might make some changes for the better.

He said that he had a message for the Syrian president, which he asked an American delegation who visited the town recently to deliver on his behalf — he wants Aramaic to be taught in schools.

It’s the language believed to have been used by Jesus. Most of the town’s population is Christian, a religious minority in Syria.

“Aramaic is a sacred language. It should be kept alive,” Zaarour said. 

He has devoted his life to teaching and preserving Aramaic.

“This language is part of our identity, proof of our existence.” 

Violence, a looming threat

Sherrer Reyhan, 17, said he speaks Aramaic with his friends, but at school, he’s taught in Arabic. He said that most of the teachers don’t speak Aramaic. They come from other parts of the country.

If Aramaic becomes part of the school curriculum, he said, students could learn from one another and the language could live on.

“It’s a beautiful language,” he said, adding that he’s grateful his parents taught him at home.

He, too, said that he was cautiously optimistic that the new government might bring about jobs and prosperity for the country. 

“Some of us younger Syrians have only known war, displacement and sanctions,” he said. 

But Reyhan has already made plans to leave Syria. There aren’t any jobs here.

“I’ve always lived here, and the only place I’ve traveled to is Damascus,” he said. “I want to leave and discover the world.”

Cafe owner Tony Moalem, 28, said it’s hard to imagine the future with so many reminders of war — like the ruins of Safir Hotel, which was overtaken by Nusra fighters in 2013.

Moalem said that the fighters launched attacks against the townspeople and their houses from the hotel.

Today, the hotel’s walls are marked with bullet holes, and its floors are covered in broken glass and twisted rebar.

“Everyone knows that violence can return at any moment,” he said.

Producer Zein Khuzam contributed reporting to this story.