Syrian people

The Syrian people (Arabic: الشعب السوري‎ / ALA-LC: al-sha‘ab al-Sūrī; Syriac: ܣܘܪܝܝܢ‎) are the inhabitants of Syria, and their ancestors who share a common Levantine Semitic ancestry. The term also refers to the citizens of Syria, regardless of ancestry, mother tongue, ethnic identity, or culture.

The cultural and linguistic heritage of the Syrian people is a blend of both indigenous elements and the foreign cultures that have come to rule the land and its people over the course of thousands of years.

The Syrian republic has a population of nearly 17 million as of 2014, in addition to 4 million Syrian refugees. The dominant racial group is the Syrian descendants of the old indigenous peoples who mixed with Arabs and identify themselves as such in addition to ethnic Aramean. The country also includes the following ethnic minorities: Armenians, Assyrians, Circassians, Greeks, Kurds, and Turkmens.

The Syrian diaspora consists of 15 million people of Syrian ancestry, who emigrated to North America (United States and Canada), European Union member states (including Sweden, France and Germany), South America (mainly in Brazil, Argentina, Chile, Venezuela and Colombia), Australia, and Africa.