alSham

Al-Sham, also transliterated ash-Sham or al-Shām, is the Arabic term for the Levant, the eastern Mediterranean region. The name is closely linked to Damascus, historically the region’s political and cultural center, and it has long functioned as a label for the broader area west of the Arabian Desert.

Geographically, Bilad al-Sham traditionally refers to the Levant and roughly corresponds to present-day Syria, Lebanon, Jordan, and Palestine (including Israel). In some historical and cartographic uses, it extends to portions of southern Turkey and the surrounding frontier zones. The precise boundaries vary by era and speaker, but Sham is consistently used to denote the Levant's core lands.

Historically, Sham was one of the principal regions of Bilad al-Sham in early Islamic and medieval geography, and it remained a cultural and political reference through the Ottoman period under various administrative arrangements. In contemporary Arabic, ash-Shām commonly denotes Syria or the Levant in general and can carry political or cultural connotations depending on context. The idea of a broader Greater Syria has appeared in political discourse, referring to a larger territorial and cultural concept linking Syria, Lebanon, Jordan, and Palestine.