Syrian Jews
The Syrian pronunciation of Hebrew is similar to that of other Mizrahi communities and is influenced both by Sephardi Hebrew and by the Syrian dialect of Levantine Arabic. The Syrian pronunciation of Hebrew is less archaic than the Iraqi Hebrew of Iraqi Jews and closer to standard Sephardic Hebrew. That affects especially the interdentals. Nevertheless, Syrian and Iraqi Hebrew are very closely related because of their location and geographic proximity, as is the case with most eastern Jewish communities in the Arabic world other than Yemenite Jews. Particular features are as follows:The retention of distinct emphatic sounds such as and differentiates Syrian pronunciation from many other Sephardic/Mizrahi pronunciations, which have failed to maintain these phonemic or phonological distinctions, such as between and .
Phoenician alphabet
The Paleo-Hebrew alphabet, used to write early Hebrew, was a regional offshoot of Phoenician; it is nearly identical to the Phoenician (in many early writings they are impossible to distinguish). The Samaritan alphabet is a direct descendant of the Paleo-Hebrew. The current Hebrew alphabet is a stylized form of the Aramaic alphabet, itself a descendant of the Phoenician script.