Syria

Syrian Arab Republic
National anthem	Homet el Diyar
Capital (and largest city)	Damascus
Official language	Arabic
Government type	Single-party republic
President	Bashir al-Assad
Area	185,180 km² 71,479 mi²
Population	19,747,586 (58th) (2007 estimate)
Population density	107/km² 276 mi²
HDI	0.724 (medium) (109th) (2007)
Currency	Syrian pound (SYP)
Time zone	EET (UTC+2) Summer:EEST (UTC+3)
Country codes	Internet TLD : .sy Calling code : +963

Syria, officially the Syrian Arab Republic, is a country in the Middle East. It borders Lebanon and the Mediterranean Sea to the west, Turkey to the north, Iraq to the east, and Jordan to the southeast. Syria has a disputed border with Israel to the southwest, and part of it, the Golan Heights, is occupied by that country.

Syria has been an important center for millennia. Its capital, Damascus, may be the oldest continuously inhabited city in the world, and it was an important center of the ancient and medieval Islamic worlds, serving as the capital of the Arab Umayyad dynasty. In modern times, Syria remains an important and influential Arab country.

History

Ancient history

The land that today forms Syria has been inhabited since ancient times. Semitic peoples, such as the Phoenicians and Arameans (the language of the latter, Aramaic, became the major spoken language in Syria and much of the Middle East), first entered the country. Empires such as the Egyptians, Babylonians, Assyrians, and Persians. In 332 bc, Syria, along with the rest of the Persian Empire, fell to Alexander the Great. It was ruled by various Greek-speaking dynasties until its conquest by the Romans in 63 bc. Syria remained under the control of the Romans, an their successors the Byzantines, until the 7th century ad. By the beginning of the 5th century ad, most of Syria had converted to Christianity.