Introduction: The study of Turkey-Syria relations

For 90-years, Syrians have celebrated May 6th as a national holiday. It was in 1916 when the Ottoman Governor of Damascus Jamal Pasha famously executed 21 Arab nationalists in Marjeh Square, in the heart of the Syrian capital, during the waning years of the Ottoman Empire. Syria at the time glorified Erdoan as that Great Leader’ while many pro-regime intellectuals drew parallels between him and Syria’s former President, Hafez al-Asad, specifically for his strong positions on Palestine. The early years of Arab nationalism fanned anti-Turkish sentiment throughout Syria at a time when the Syrian Republic was young and needed to break with its immediate, yet very long and dominant, Ottoman past. The years of animosity are well-known to observers of Syrian-Turkish relations, starting with the end of World War I and lasting until Erdoan came to power in 2003. The rise of Erdoan was indeed a turning point in Syrian-Turkish relations.