Ethnic groups in Syria

Syria is a multi-ethnic country, made up of several ethnic groups.

Ethnicity and religion are intertwined in Syria as in other countries in the region, but there are also nondenominational, supraethnic and suprareligious political identities, like Syrian nationalism.

Since the 1960 census there has been no counting of Syrians by religion, and there has never been any official counting by ethnicity or language. In the 1943 and 1953 censuses the various subcreeds were counted separately, e.g. for every Christian denomination. In 1960 Christians were counted as a whole but Muslims were still counted separately between Sunnis, Alawis and Druzes.

Before the Civil War began in 2011, the Syrian population was estimated at roughly 23 million permanent inhabitants, including between 1,000,000 and 1,500,000 Iraqi refugees of various ethnicities and creeds, 580,000 Palestinian refugees, mostly Sunni Arabs, and an unknown number of Lebanese or Lebanese-Syrian dual citizens, mostly Shia Arabs and Christian Arabs of various subcreeds. Palestinians and Lebanese had been living in Syria sometimes since several generations. More than four million refugees, Syrians as well as "Non-Syrians" have left the country during the course of the Civil War.

Most Syrians speak Arabic, most are Sunni Muslims, but there are no accurate numbers or percentages of the various "majority" and "minority" groups. Sunni Arab Syrians could be anywhere between 60% and 69% as non-Arabic-speaking groups (mostly Kurds) are usually estimated at about 4%, non-Sunni Muslim groups (mostly Alawis) at more than 20% and Arabic-speaking Christians are 10%, but these are only indicative percentages.

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