PROBLEMS OF THE ARMENIANS OF SYRIA: THE ARMENIAN COMMUNITY OF DAMASCUS

"Noravank" Foundation
09 March 2009

Araks Pashayan

Armenians settled in Syria from ancient times. Armenia had secular
historical and cultural ties with that region. The Armenian community
of Syria widened in 1915 by the emigrants, who had escaped the Armenian
Genocide and then by the refugees from Cilicia. At current moment the
number of Armenians in Syria is about 65-70 thousands. There are large
Armenian communities in Aleppo, Kamishli, Damascus, Latakia, Kesap.
Armenian Apostolic Church has two dioceses in Syria: the diocese of
Beria (with the residence of the head of the diocese in Srb. Qarasun
mankunq (St. Forty chrisoms) church in Aleppo) and the Diocese of
Damascus (with the residence of the head of the dioceses in Srb. Sargis
(St. Sargis) church).

The Armenian community of Damascus, which is one of the traditional and
accomplished communities, takes a special place among the Armenians of
Syria. The number of the Armenians of Damascus does not exceed 5-6
thousands.

The Armenian apostolic community (as well as other Christian
communities) is regarded on behalf of the state as a religious
minority, which is represented by the Armenian Apostolic Diocese of
Damascus belonging to Echmiadzin. In fact, the church represents its
community to the state and the state to the community. The Armenian
community of Damascus has local national authorities, which have worked
basing on the national constitution elaborated in 1853 and ratified in
1863 by the sultan’s government. At present moment the head of the
Armenian Diocese of Damask is His Holiness bishop Arsham Nalbandyan.

The domestic affairs of the community are administered by the Council
of province, the legislative organ, which chooses the City council
playing the role of the executive organ. Armenians gained real scope in
the issue of the arrangement of their national life. They were allowed
to teach Armenian and Christianity in Armenian.

Syrian Armenians have good reputation and recognition in the country.
In different periods of Syrian history Armenians assisted Arabs,
including their struggle for independence. At the second half of the
19th century in the period of national, cultural and political blossom
(Nahda) the people of Armenian descent played a significant role. Among
them one of the founders of professional Arab theatre Adib Ishak
(1856-1882) and Rzkallah Hasun (1823-1880) who is supposed to be the
founder of Arab political journalism. There are a lot of Armenians who
became the officers of Syrian Arab Republic and took part in the
defense of the country and general-lieutenant Aram Karamanukyan, who is
supposed to be one of the founders of Syrian army, took part in
Arab-Israeli war in 1948.

Today Armenians of Syria, including Armenians of Damascus, are also
actively involved in social and economic and cultural spheres. The name
of the conductor of the symphonic orchestra of Syria Misak Baghbudaryan
is rather well-known in Damascus. There are three members of the
writers union of Syria ` Nora Arisyan from Damascus, Alexander
Keshishyan and Hrach Kalsahakyan.

The Armenians of Damascus are mainly involved in trades and private
enterprise. At current moment there are almost no Armenians among
military and state figures. The number of intellectual persons is not
big. There are only some individuals engaged in academic science.

It is characteristic that in Syria, including Damascus, for the last
twenty years the Armenian youth has been showing much more interest in
education and there are even more young people who have gone into
higher education than in 1970-1980th and this mainly due to the
improvement of the wealth of the Armenians.

The activities of the Armenian parties in Syria are prohibited that is
why they work under restrictions in Damascus, i.e. in the frame of
public, cultural and sport organizations and unions (clubs). The
Armenian community of Syria is, in fact, a net structure, because all
the unions and religious trends have their substructures or branches in
almost all the districts inhabited by the Armenians. Various sports and
cultural events are arranged in those clubs. The most well-known in
Damascus is `Knar’ chorus, directed by Shant Keshishyan, which was
established in 1960
th by the Armenian catholic union.

The unions working in Damascus are officially licensed and registered
in the Ministry of Social Affairs and Labour; they have their own
regulations and they follow the order of the Ministry. The branches of
Hamazkayin Armenian (Pan-Armenian) Educational and cultural
Association, the New Generation cultural Union, Armenian General
Benevolent Union, Tekeyan Cultural Union, and Armenian Catholic Union
work in Damascus. Though belonging to different associations reflects
rather complicated inner mosaic but it does not affect the protection
of Armeniancy.

The Armenians of Damascus belong to different religious trends with
some special peculiarities. The apostolic, catholic and evangelistic
communities are distinguished. The largest is the apostolic community.
Armenian Catholics have residences in Damascus and Aleppo, and Armenian
evangelists in Aleppo. The spiritual leader of Armenian Catholics is
Bishop Hovsep Arnautyan and the leader of Armenian evangelistic church
is Tatev Pasmachyan. There is close cooperation between Armenian
apostolic, catholic and evangelistic churches. By joint efforts they
arrange some all-Armenian events, including those confined to the April
24th.

The Catholic community of Damascus is small, mainly Arab speaking; they
have a residence and church, which is the centre of the community. The
`connecting link’ of the community is Sargis Keshishyan who plays a
significant role in the arranging of the national life of the Armenian
catholic community. As for the Armenian Evangelists then their
community is also small but as compared with the Catholics it is more
Armenian speaking. Armenian Evangelists have their church and school in
Damascus.

Arab speaking (mainly catholic) old Armenians (arman kadim) form the
special stratum among the Armenians of Damascus. Their national
consciousness is almost fully clouded.

The embassy of the RA in Syria plays a great role in the issue of
rallying the Armenian community of Damask. All Armenian unions are
invited to the events arranged by the embassy including the
representatives of catholic and evangelistic communities.

In recent years there has been only one Armenian member of Syrian
parliament due to the demographic factor. The Armenian candidate is
regarded as a candidate from Armenian Diocese of Aleppo (Berio) and is
elected on party list. The last parliamentary elections took place on
April 2007. The present Armenian member of Syrian parliament is S.
Sumbulyan, who became the deputy for the second time. He is a member of
the parliamentary commission on external affairs and the chairman of
the parliamentary commission on Armenian-Syrian friendship. The
Armenians of Damascus are not engaged in politics, though there are
members of ruling party `Baas’ among them.

The issue of the dioceses is one of the most topical issues for the
Armenian community of Damascus1, which has in some sense divided
community into two wings. The first includes the circles oriented on
Echmiadzin, i.e. hnchakyan, beneficial, ramkavar, communist circles,
and the second are the dashnak circles, which has Antiliasian
orientation and they tend to return the Damascus diocese to Cilician
cathalicosat; they consider that the belonging of Damascus diocese to
Ehcmiandzin is illegal. They boycott all the events arranged under the
sponsorship of the leader of the Armenian Diocese of Damascus. That
issue of the Diocese has turned into practically unsolvable problem. It
is supposed that the problem of the diocese brings some activity to the
life of the community but this seeming activity, in fact, is a result
of unhealthy competition, and the new generation in most cases is tired
of old controversies.

The Armenians of Damascus being integrated to the Syrian society at the
same time tend to preserve their national identity. There are national
schools (as well as nurseries) in the community belonging to the
Armenian apostolic community. The following schools are known in
Damascus: Targmanchats (Translators) National School, the first
educational institution established in Damascus (1898), National Joint
School (1929), Kyulpenkyan-Sahakyan School of Kyulap (1929). There are
also three schools of Armenian Catholics and one school of Evangelists.
After graduating from the school Armenian pupils continue their
education either in Arab20or in private (paid) schools. National Joint
school today has 170 Armenian pupils. In the near future the school
will move to a more modern building, which is situated in one of the
suburbs of Damascus. There are 160 pupils in Kyulpenkyan-Sahakyan
School of Kyulap and 350 in Targmanchats School.

The national education goes on both in sports and cultural unions and
in the family. According to the point of view of one part of Armenians
of Damascus Armenian education is most strongly expressed in dashnak
circles.

There are no Armenian newspapers published in Damascus, but they get it
from Beirut. The most widespread newspapers are `Azdak’ and `Zartonk’.
`Gandzasar’ weekly from Armenian Diocese of Aleppo (Berio) and other
periodicals are also delivered to Damascus. Though there are printing
houses, which belong to Armenians in Damascus but no Armenian
literature is published there.

There are also beneficial organizations working in the Armenian
community of Damascus. The poor care commission of Srb. Sargis (St.
Sargis) church, which was established in 1890th, the Cross of help of
Syrian Armenians ` a women’s beneficial organization established in
1929 on the initiative of Armenian Revolutionary Federation
Dashnakcutyun.

Both Syrian authorities and the society take kindly to the Armenians of
Syria. This is conditioned by their merits, their reliable and
law-abiding behavior (in the opinion of the lecturer of Damascus
University Nora Arisyan in certain cases Armenians know their
responsibilities better than their rights), and also by the tolerant
policy of the present authorities towards the religious minorities. At
present the representatives of various ethnic and religious trends
peacefully coexist in Syria. Separate mosques and churches are located
side by side. Armenian spiritual figures from time to time meet not
only Muslim religious figures but also the representatives of other
Christian or religious trends to discuss the issues of collaboration,
the interfaith dialogue and the religious and ethnic tolerance.

In spite of this, there is an internal danger concerning security.
Interethnic and interfaith discrepancies in Iraq spark concern as a
possible precedent in case of the problems of the same kind. The
processes, going on in the neighbour countries also have an economic
impact on Syria. It is not a mere chance that the intensifying
emigration also has economical motives. Armenians mainly emigrate to
the US, Canada, and the Gulf countries. The most part of the emigrants
are young and they go to study (mainly to the US and Europe) and never
return.

Today the Armenians of Damascus faced various problems which are, on
the one hand, connected with the preserving of the Armenian identity
and, on the other hand, with economic issues. The efforts focused on
preserving of Armenian identity are get
ting even more difficult; the
influence of foreign cultures is growing, there is a lot of Arab
speaking families which appetence to stay in Armenian environment is
reducing, the number of mixed marriages is growing at some extent
(mainly with Christian Arabs). According to the leader of the Armenian
diocese of Damascus Bishop Arsham Nalbandyan there is a certain
stratum, which is `lazy’ in national sense and stay away from
everything.

The Armenians of Syria, including the Armenians of Damascus have
certain expectations concerning activation of national life from
Armenia. They want Armenia range itself on the side of all-Armenian
interests and Diaspora. There are some realities in Armenia they regard
negatively. The Armenians of Damascus are first of all concerned about
a number of vicious occurrences such as, e.g. the expansion of the
religious sects. After many of them (including Armenians from Syria in
general) faced on different occasions administrative and social
problems in Armenia, they regard it a country, which is still in the
progress. In accordance with separate points of view the Republic of
Armenia is not a Motherland they were dreaming of. This circumstance
may cause in many cases the crisis of national consciousness.

From the point of view of boosting national life in Damascus the
satellite television, which allows to watch `Õ1′ (Public Armenian
Television H1) programmes, plays great role.

Though the Armenian community of Damascus manages traditional and
efficient mechanisms of self-regulation and has a substantial potential
it needs to modernize the traditional functions of national
organization.

1The Damascus Diocese was formed in the middle of the 15th century by
Jerusalem patriarchy and worked under its management till 1929. In
order to reform the Great Cathalicosat of Cilicia (after the Armenian
Genocide and the exile of the Armenians from Cilicia only Aleppo
Diocese stayed under its protectorate) in 1929 with the blessing of the
Cathalicos of All Armenians Gevorg V Surenyanc the patriarchy of
Jerusalem assigned Damascus Diocese, together with the Diocese of
Beirut and Cyprus to the Cathalicosat of Cilicia. After the church
split in 1956 the administrative belonging of the Diocese has not been
clarified yet. At present the head of the Damascus Diocese is appointed
non-officially froim Echmiadzin.

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