White supremacy informs discourse on “sectarianism” in Syria. This is the perfect example. If Trump started bombing black people and POC and they railed against white people you’d say they were playing his game. https://twitter.com/Elizrael/status/1137290622547701760

The largely white Western “supporters” have done this for years when discussing “sectarianism.” From what I’ve seen, when Syrians talk about “sectarianism,” it has a radically different meaning and connotations than when Westerners discuss it.

In my experience, when Syrians talk about sectarianism in the opposition, they refer to the violent process by which Assad attempted to center the revolution around communal identities and why people should work against this gravity to realize its goals.

However, when Westerners say “sectarianism,” it’s code for “illegitimate.” Their discourse entirely lacks the nuance present in Syrian discussions and is used to equate those in the opposition who took on a more religious identity with Nusra/AlQaeda/HTS, ISIS, and the regime.

To the Westerners, anyone who veered off the course they imagined Syrians should follow (whitewashed 60s Civil Rights era protesters) and became closer to their religious identities in the face of betrayal by the world delegitimized their own struggle. This is racist.

Many of the civil rights leaders and protesters were deeply religious and used it as a source of strength, which is typically shorn from white supporters’ narratives. Of course people in the opposition began to more outwardly identify with religion under Assad’s barrel bombs.

Syria never had a chance to develop civil society and was fractured by the regime along religious, regional, and racial lines, which meant religious identities carry far more meaning than “sectarianism” as used by Westerners conveys.

In the 60s in the US we saw the rise of the Black Panthers and Young Lords, Black and Brown Pride, all of which grew around the identities of people whose material oppression was based on these very identities. Yet when this happens to Syrians it’s “sectarianism.”