Online Political Activism in Syria: Sentiment Analysis of Social Media

Download or read book Online Political Activism in Syria: Sentiment Analysis of Social Media written by Ahmed K. Al-Rawi and published by . This book was released on 2016 with total page pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Unlike other Arab countries that witnessed swift political changes during the Arab Spring, the conflict in Syria is still unfolding. Sunni rebels formed the Free Syrian Army and other armed factions to fight the Alawite regime of Bashar Assad. However, it seems that the conflict is more recently defined as a civil war between the countrys two main sects rather than a revolution against Assads totalitarian rule. This study analyzes a popular Facebook page that is created by the Syrian opposition group that is called "The Syrian Revolution 2011 against Bashar Assad" (https://ar-ar.facebook.com/Syrian.Revolution). Using a webometric tool, a total of 114,437 posts and comments are retrieved and analyzed using a computer software that is suitable for big data analysis in order to understand the sentiments associated with this kind of online activism.