During the ongoing civil war, the Syrian opposition, represented by the Syrian National Council, then by the National Coalition for Syrian Revolutionary and Opposition Forces (commonly named the Syrian National Coalition) used a modified version of the independence flag first used in 1932. The independence flag began to be used as a universal display of the protesting opposition in late 2011, and in 2016 is recognized as “the symbol of Syria’s uprising”.

The opposition wanted to distinguish themselves from the current Syrian government and favoured the use of the flag used when Syria gained its independence from France. Officials from the Syrian National Council now believe this flag also represents independence and the end of Bashar al-Assad’s government. Today the flag is mainly used in areas controlled by the Syrian National Coalition. The use of the independence flag parallels the Libyan rebels’ use of the pre-Gaddafi Libyan flag from the era of the Kingdom of Libya instead of Muammar Gaddafi’s green flag.

Source: Wikipedia.