As Syria reels from the latest wave of violence in Suweida—marked by sectarian slogans, mass killings, and the collapse of trust—two deeper, quieter battles resurface beneath the gunfire: one over identity, and the other over belonging. In the space where the state has failed, older instincts have returned: the tribal faz‘a, once a gesture of solidarity, is now a weapon of retribution. And in the aftermath of revolution, a new cultural divide has emerged—between those hardened by war and those mocked as “cute activists” for choosing words over weapons.
In this joint article, writers Ahmad Jassem Al-Hussein and Hossam Jazmati reflect on Syria’s unraveling social fabric. One traces the mutation of faz‘a from community lifeline to tool of internal siege. The other explores how softness and civic engagement became suspect in a country that came to worship roughness and revenge. Together, they reveal the hidden costs of a nation still fighting over the meaning of loyalty, courage, and who gets to claim Syria’s future.
Syria, the Land of the “Faz‘a”
In the Levant, faz‘a once meant something noble: an instinctive rush to help—whether to harvest wheat, build a roof, fight a fire, or grieve with a neighbor. Much like volunteering in the West, faz‘a was rooted in solidarity, kinship, and shared survival. I remember it from my childhood in Raqqa: men dropping everything to save a scorched field or lift a collapsed wall. It was instinctive, selfless, human.
But in today’s Syria, according to Ahmad Jassem Al-Hussein, faz‘a has changed. It no longer arrives only in times of natural hardship, but in times of political vengeance. What was once a force for good now arrives with rifles, slogans, and vengeance. A faz‘a today can mean tribal militias mobilizing against other Syrians, or communities arming themselves for survival—not just against outsiders, but against one another.
This regression has roots. The state is fractured. Citizenship is hollow. Trust is gone. In this vacuum, people cling to what is older than the nation: tribe, sect, family. And in clinging, they fight. Syria today witnesses the return of pre-political reflexes—not in the name of national survival, but of mutual annihilation.
It’s not that tribalism or sectarian identity are inherently violent. In fact, a conscious tribal awareness or sectarian awareness could become part of a post-conflict civic identity. But we’re far from that. What we have instead is a Syria where faz‘a has been weaponized—where groups call in their kin not to build or heal, but to punish.
Even our language is cracking under pressure. In a country once unanimous in viewing collaboration with Israel as treason, that consensus has now splintered. One side now sees foreign alliance as survival, another as betrayal. Every word now carries danger. A cup of coffee may spill over and scald the hand; a misplaced sentence may ignite a new faz‘a.
Syria is no longer merely a battleground of factions—it is a crucible of unresolved visions of the state. We are not simply fighting over power; we are fighting over meaning. And that, perhaps, is the most dangerous war of all.
The Rise of the “Cute Activist”
In another part of this same Syria, a different figure emerged—mocked and admired, dismissed and needed: the “cute activist,” according to columnist Hussam Jazmati.
The term cute—borrowed from English and once used to mean charming, smart, or kind—has in Syria acquired a bitter edge. It now often refers, half-mockingly, to those soft-spoken civil society activists, media workers, and rights advocates who, during the war, chose cameras and keyboards over Kalashnikovs.
Their sin? Not fighting. Not being rough enough. Not looking or sounding like the men in camouflage who came to define heroism.
In the early revolutionary days, the split was subtle: activists vs. fighters, those on the ground vs. those abroad. But as the war hardened, the line deepened. Fighters risked death, endured siege, and earned the right to dictate. Activists—especially those trained abroad, sipping lattes between workshops on humanitarian law—were labeled “cute”. And in a country burning alive, cute was the last thing anyone wanted to be.
After Assad’s fall, this divide only deepened. The “liberated” zones became spaces of domination, where “rough men” ruled not just territory, but memory and meaning. Meanwhile, the returnees—writers, artists, lawyers—found themselves ridiculed or sidelined. Their old hopes for pluralism and justice clashed with a new reality shaped by militias, revenge, and cultural rigidity.
The irony is suffocating: those mocked for being too gentle were often the ones who believed most deeply in Syria’s revolution—not its weapons, but its words. Many were from major cities, had seen the inside of Assad’s prisons, had lost friends to snipers. But to their new overlords, their “softness” was proof of weakness, their values a Western infection.
The term cute came to symbolize not just personal style, but political guilt: a suspicion that civility itself was betrayal. As if care for minorities or concern for international law were acts of treason. As if advocating for inclusion was code for weakness.
A Shared Collapse
What ties the faz‘a and the cute activist together is not just their contrast—but their tragedy. One was once a mechanism of solidarity, now turned into tribalized revenge. The other was once a bearer of ideals, now mocked into silence. Together, they reflect a nation that lost its balance—between force and thought, kinship and citizenship, fire and law.
We have entered an era where even decency is dangerous, where every call to peace is met with suspicion, where every refusal to pick up a gun feels like treason. Where the only acceptable faz‘a is one soaked in blood, and every “cute” gesture is seen as cowardice.
But Syria’s future—if it still has one—lies precisely in those “cute” values: empathy, justice, inclusion, restraint. And perhaps even in a reclaimed faz‘a: one that does not rush to avenge, but to rebuild. One that dares to believe, once again, that being Syrian means more than joining a side.
