armenians in syria

Aram Karamanokian, one of the Armenian founders of the Syrian Army in 1946
Aram Karamanokian (1910-1996) joined the French-created Army of the Levant during the years of the Mandate. In 1948, he was appointed Commander of Missile Command by President Shukri al-Quwatli and served in this capacity during the Palestine War. He was retired from the Army in 1957 and became an MP for Aleppo in 1961. He died in New York at the age of 86 in 1996. In his will, he asked that his remains are divided between Armenia and Aleppo. Karamanokian was the first Armenian officer to assume a commanding role in the Syrian Army in the 1940s.

A statement by the Armenian Patriarch of Syria after the French assault on Damascus on May 29, 1945
In it, the Patriarch says: "If the Lord were French, I would have stopped worshiping Him." The Patriarch famously called on all Armenian recruits in the French-created Army of the Levant to defect after the French bombardment of Damascus in 1945. In reward, President Shukri al-Quwatli awarded him the Order of Merit of the Syrian Republic, Excellence Class, after the French evacuation in 1946.

The parliamentary election campaign of 16 MPs for the first post-union Parliament in December 1961
The coalition, called the United Coalition, includes prominent Sunnis, Christians and Armenians. Among the nominees are ex-Prime Minister Maarouf al-Dawalibi, People's Party chiefs Ahmad Qanbar and Rashad Barmada, National Party member Leon Zamariya, the Aleppo notables Alaa al-Din al-Jabiri and Nihad Ibrahim Pasha, ex-Justice Minister Asaad Kourani, and Aram Karamanokian, a retired of the Palestine war of 1948 who held the military post of Commander of Missile Command. From the archives of Jamil Murad