Albert Barnes Commentary Deuteronomy 26:5

"And thou shalt answer and say before Jehovah thy God, A Syrian ready to perish was my father; and he went down into Egypt, and sojourned there, few in number; and he became there a nation, great, mighty, and populous." — Deuteronomy 26:5 (ASV)

A Syrian ready to perish was my father - The reference is shown by the context to be to Jacob, as the ancestor in whom particularly the family of Abraham began to develop into a nation (compare Isaiah 43:22, Isaiah 43:28, etc.).

Jacob is called a Syrian (literally, Aramaean), not only because of his own long residence in Syria with Laban (Genesis 29–31), as our Lord was called a Nazarene because of His residence at Nazareth (Matthew 2:23), but also because he married and had his children there ; and might be said accordingly to belong to that land more than to any other.