Although Syria’s Ministry of Information has celebrated advances in the country’s press freedom rankings, these advances are primarily due to the end of the civil war and the fact that the benchmark set by the Assad regime was so low. While the ministry claims to support an efficient and transparent process ofissuing permits for foreign journalists, the reality tells a story of delays and stonewalling when the ministry has issues with critical press coverage.
The ministry has recently become embroiled in further controversy with a new video it issued on “six prohibited things.” This announcement was done via video. I provide the full translation below:
“There are six prohibited things in publication and media, and they are as follows:
1. It is forbidden to publish any secret information or documents related to the army, security, or sovereign state matters, or incite to violence, rioting and contravention of the public laws.
2. Any content containing mockery or insult of heavenly religions or religious symbols or creeds is prohibited.
3. Any content calling for hatred or discrimination between citizens on the basis of ethnicity, colour, religion, gender or sect or tribal identity is prohibited.
4. The law prohibits violation of privacy or revealing secrets of private life ofindividuals, or publishing their photos and the details of their family life without their prior position, or defaming and slandering them, or directing curses and insults at persons or commissions.
5. Criminalisation of publication of news and misleading content and unconfirmed information that naturally misleads public opinion. The ban is extended to include rumours that harm the national economy.
6. It is prohibited to publish or promote materials that violate public etiquette or the ethical system.”
Commenting on the video, Ministry of Information official Omar Hajj Ahmad claimed that the video “does not represent a list of restrictions as some have interpreted them,” but is rather meant to serve as guidance and awareness-raising, and “summarising general rulings that come in Syrian media covenants and legislative acts, which organise media work and define its rights and obligations.” He added that regulation of media is based on three complementary systems: (i) a professional code of conduct, (ii) a media law that serves as the legal and administrative framework for media institutions but will be replaced when the parliament is organised and begins operating, and (iii) other national laws like those of “transitional justice” and “electronic crimes.” As such then, the video does not aim to “impose new restrictions on freedom ofopinion and expression.”
Of note is that Omar’s post claims that the regulations are partly based on prior laws, though he does not mention what those prior laws are. The relevant legislation in fact mostly comes from the era of the Assad regime. Pro-revolution activist Ahmad Abazeid argues in an X article (notably shared by Razzan Saffour, a British-Syrian activist who has served with the new government and has otherwise been very supportive of the government- which should tell you something about the controversy here) that the main legal basis for these prohibitions is presidential decree 108 for the year 2011, issued by Bashar al-Assad on 28 August 2011 at a time when the regime was confronting the rise of revolutionary activism in the form of coordination committees and media centres.
He notes that while the Ministry of Information does not literally reproduce the law’s regulations, it uses this decree and parts of decree 26 from the same year and modifies them slightly. For comparison, article 12 of decree 108 prohibits “media outlets” from publishing any content that " naturally harms national unity, national security, or harms the heavenly religions and religious creeds or stirs up sectarian or sect-based hatred"; “any content that naturally incites to committing crimes, acts of violence and terrorism, or incites to hatred and racism"; “news and information concerning the army and armed forces, except what is issued by the army and armed forces and permitted for publication"; “all that is banned from publication in the general law of sanctions and valid legislations and all the courts prohibit from publishing"; and finally “everything that harms the symbols of the state.”
The relevant legislation in fact mostly comes from the era of the Assad regime.
Likewise, article 21 of decree 26 prohibits “electronic sites” from publishing any official documents that are not allowed to be published; “incorrect information"; content that stirs up sectarian hatred, infringes upon “public morals or religious feelings"; and content that incites to “commit crimes” or encourages pornography, human trafficking and drug trafficking. Ahmad also suggests that the regime’s “electronic crimes law” of 2022 has some influence on the list of prohibitions. For example, article 28 of that law prohibited the publication of any “fake news” on the Internet that would “naturally harm the state’s status or infringe upon national unity”, while article 29 prohibited the publication of any digital content with the intention of “causing deterioration or instability or undermining confidence in the national currency banknotes or exchange rates set in the official gazettes.”
A reasonable conclusion that Ahmad makes, and one which I share, is that not all the prohibitions are inherently bad, but rather the primary problem lies in inconsistency on the part of the authorities. The truth is that sectarian incitement is a big problem on Syrian social media, and the country would indeed be better off with a crackdown on this kind of behaviour, but the fact is that the authorities have done little to deal with this problem. We see few if any reports of arrests for incitement of hatred towards Druze, Alawites and Shia (for example). For example, here is a person who was a member of Hay’at Tahrir al-Sham’s forces and originates from Latakia, celebrating the Islamic State’s massacre of Iraqi Shia committed at Camp Speicher in 2014 as part of its genocidal worldview that no Shia should exist on Earth. He may not be a member of Islamic State, but he certainly shares its contempt for the ‘Rafidites’ (a derogatory term for Shia):
This individual, whom I have routinely seen post sectarian content, has faced no consequences for his actions on social media. By contrast, arrests that have happened in relation to publication of media content primarily relate to sharp criticism of officials or businessmen- criticism of businessmen deemed ofimportance to the state in particular seems to be the implied target behind prohibiting the publication of “rumours that harm the national economy.”
The controversy over media freedom highlights more than ever the need for Syria’s parliament to convene and start getting to work on revising legislation pertaining to freedom of expression and other fundamental freedoms. Moreover, the government should stop feeling that it is hostage to Sunni populist sentiment and rage: ‘Syria for all Syrians’ should not be a mere slogan but an actual policy.
Published originally on June 27, 2026.
