By: Fern Sidman

In a development that would have been unimaginable only a few years ago, the Syrian transitional government has registered its first-ever Jewish organization, marking an unprecedented milestone in the country’s fraught relationship with its Jewish past and the broader Middle Eastern Jewish diaspora. According to a report on Thursday at Fox News Digital, Syria’s minister of social affairs and labor approved the registration of the Jewish Heritage in Syria Foundation (JHS) on Wednesday—an act that signals a dramatic shift in the nation’s cultural, political, and religious landscape.

The registration grants JHS legal standing to operate openly in Syria, establishing formal ties with government bodies, cultural institutions, and local communities. For the first time, a Jewish organization is permitted to possess office space, protect Jewish heritage sites, coordinate the return of Jewish communal properties, and facilitate organized Jewish travel to the country, including delegations tracing ancestral roots in Damascus and Aleppo.

As Fox News Digital reported, the registration was carried out by Hind Kabawat, a prominent Syrian reform advocate and the first woman to hold a cabinet-level position in the transitional government. Kabawat described the decision as not only symbolic but foundational to building a more inclusive future.

“Judaism and Syrian Jews have long been part of Syria’s religious and cultural landscape. Restoring their right to belong, to visit and to live back in their homeland is a natural step toward a more just, tolerant and inclusive society,” Kabawat told Fox News Digital in a statement that called attention to the administration’s stated commitment to reconciliation and pluralism.

Kabawat emphasized that generations of Syrian Jews were denied the right to celebrate their heritage openly. Jewish schools were shuttered, movement was restricted, and property ownership became precarious amid the rising tide of hostility following the creation of the State of Israel in 1948. Many families had their assets seized, their livelihoods destroyed, and their ability to worship curtailed. For decades, communal life existed only in fragments, closely monitored by the Assad security apparatus.

Wednesday’s announcement, she said, marks a departure from this dark history. According to the information provided in the Fox News Digital report, Kabawat expressed hope that this step would encourage longer-term peace-building efforts, strengthen the transitional government’s legitimacy, and help Syria reimagine itself as a pluralistic society after years of war, dictatorship, and sectarian division.

Prior to 1948, Syria was home to a thriving Jewish population numbering between 30,000 and 40,000, concentrated primarily in Damascus, Aleppo, and Qamishli. Its synagogues, marketplaces, rabbinic courts, and schools formed one of the oldest continuous Jewish communities in the world, with roots dating back to biblical times.

Yet as Fox News Digital chronicled, the decades that followed saw the near-total collapse of that community, driven by government persecution, economic marginalization, travel bans, and the political weaponization of Jewish identity amid the Arab-Israeli conflict. By the early 1990s, the few remaining Jewish families were permitted to emigrate, mostly to the United States and Israel. Today, only a handful remain inside Syria, their institutions shattered by time, neglect, and more recently, the ravages of the 14-year civil war.

Speaking with Fox News Digital from the Jewish quarter in Damascus, Henry Hamra—a Syrian American Jew and president of the newly registered JHS—described the vertiginous emotions of returning to the land his family once called home.

“We’re ready to start working on the synagogues and to start getting all the people to come see what we have here — a beautiful place. And we’re ready for everybody to come,” Hamra said, standing near one of the city’s few surviving Jewish landmarks.

His son Joseph expressed similar sentiments: joy, relief, and cautious optimism. “Being able to regularly travel to Damascus and Aleppo brings me so much joy. Syria was closed off to us for so long. The Assad regime would arrest anyone who even met with a Jew or hosted a Jewish person. Today, Syria is finally back to its people regardless of faith or ethnicity.”

As the Fox News Digital report detailed, the dramatic transformation in Syria’s posture toward Jews stems directly from the collapse of Bashar al-Assad’s decades-long dictatorship. Assad’s regime, which inherited its power from his father Hafez al-Assad, had long enforced strict prohibitions on Jewish communal activity, maintained close surveillance on Jewish families, and prevented diaspora Jews from visiting or reclaiming property.

But the regime’s downfall, which occurred one year ago in a lightning military offensive that toppled more than 50 years of Alawite family rule, introduced a period of profound political recalibration. Monday marked the anniversary of that moment, with tens of thousands gathering in Damascus to commemorate what many described as a national rebirth.

It is within this tectonic realignment—political, cultural, and ideological—that JHS has been able to emerge as a recognized entity, marking a sharp departure from half a century of repression.

Hamra, speaking again to Fox News Digital, noted that he has traveled to Syria four times since the regime’s fall, something that would have been unthinkable even two years ago. His visits have revealed both the scale of destruction and the enduring beauty of Syria’s Jewish patrimony.

According to the report at Fox News Digital, Damascus was once home to 22 synagogues. Most now lie in ruins.

One of the most significant losses is the Jobar Synagogue—also known as Eliyahu Hanavi—believed to be one of the oldest synagogues in the world, with traditions linking it to the biblical prophet Elijah. Once a centerpiece of Syrian Jewish life, the synagogue was devastated during the civil war, its ancient walls reduced to rubble.

Hamra described the emotional weight of standing amid its remains: “We saw the rubble of the Jobar Synagogue… It was heartbreaking.”

Yet amid the destruction, signs of survival remain. The Faranj Synagogue, Hamra told Fox News Digital, is one of the few still largely intact. “It still has their books and Torah scrolls. It’s a work of art, really.”

Its preservation offers a glimmer of hope for what JHS aims to achieve—restoration, documentation, and renewed cultural engagement.

Developments in Washington may further accelerate Syria’s transition. As Fox News Digital reported, the Caesar Syria Civilian Protection Act—America’s most restrictive sanctions regime on Syria since 2019—is now on the verge of repeal, with removal provisions embedded in the 2026 National Defense Authorization Act (NDAA).

The NDAA passed the House on Wednesday and now awaits Senate approval before heading to President Trump for signature.

For Hamra and others seeking deeper rehabilitation of Syrian Jewish heritage, the rollback of U.S. sanctions could open new channels for investment, restoration projects, cultural tourism, and diaspora engagement.

The registration of the Jewish Heritage in Syria Foundation stands as a symbol of profound change—a gesture toward a long-suppressed history and a future still deeply uncertain. As Fox News Digital has meticulously documented, Syria’s Jewish community was once a vibrant thread in the country’s cultural tapestry, later torn violently from the fabric of national life. The new recognition does not erase that history, but it offers a rare opportunity to reclaim part of it.

Whether this moment marks the beginning of a sustained reconciliation or a fleeting political gesture will depend on the resilience of Syria’s transitional institutions, the durability of political reforms, and the willingness of Jewish descendants worldwide to reconnect with a homeland from which they were once forcibly estranged.

For now, however, the significance of this step remains undeniable. After decades of silence, erasure, and exile, Syria has taken its first formal step toward acknowledging—and protecting—its Jewish heritage. And as the Fox News Digital report emphasized, the families who lost their homes, synagogues, and property now hold at least the hope that their history will no longer be relegated to ruins and memory alone.