Syria's Assad:

Popular Interests, Pan-Arabism Harmed by Arab States’ Policies

TEHRAN (defapress) – Syrian President Bashar al-Assad said dealing with issues affecting the Arab nation and pan-Arabism requires serious work to clear up some concepts that targeted the nation, including attempts to undermine the relation between Arabism and Islam.

News ID: 67006

Date: 15 November 2017 - 12:40

Assad delivered the speech while meeting participants in the Arab Forum for Confronting Zionist-US Reactionary Alliance and Supporting the Resistance of the Palestinian people, which is attended by forces, parties, and figures from several Arab states on Tuesday, according to SANA news agency.

Assad stressed the need to disprove claims of there being a contradiction between Arabism and Islam, as well as disproving any ethnic discourse, adding that the policies of some Arab states that worked against the interests of the Arab people have also affected pan-Arabism.

The war on Syria, Assad said, hasn’t affected the Syrians’ faith in the inevitability of victory against terrorism, nor has it weakened its adherence to their identity, creed, and pan-Arab affiliation.

Discussions during the meeting touched on developments in politics and on the ground, the issue of reconstruction in Syria, the situation and pressing issues in the Arab arena, and the need to focus on raising pan-Arab awareness among youths.

"So, undermining this relation through Islamic extremism undermines Arabism. They diverted Islam and pushed it towards extremism. It separated itself from Arabism, and Islam and Arabism became weaker. Someone might ask why I am talking about Arabism and Islam and not Arabism and Christianity. I would say that of course this is the same relationship; the relationship between nationalism and religion, but colonialism and enemies of pan-Arabism didn’t work in this direction, rather they focused on Arabism and Islam,” he explained.