Alawites for Assad
Why the Syrian Sect Backs the Regime
Article Summary and Author Biography
The Alawites stand by Assad out of a historic fear of Sunni persecution. Although some Alawites are breaking ranks, most face a dilemma: by continuing to support the regime, they may invite the very Sunni revenge that they dread.
LEON GOLDSMITH is a Middle East Researcher at the University of Otago in New Zealand.
Author Interview
A onetime high-ranking Syrian Army officer on the state of the revolt in Syria.
Letter From
As fighting takes place along Syria's central artery running northward from Homs to Idlib, minority Alawites are increasingly setting up shop in a coastal enclave, looking to cordon themselves off from the chaos that they believe will come as President Bashar al-Assad's grip on the country weakens.
A rally in downtown Damascus earlier this month. (Khaled Al Hariri / Courtesy Reuters)
Since the start of the revolt in Syria, the country’s Alawites have been instrumental in maintaining President Bashar al-Assad’s hold on power. A sect of Shia Islam, the Alawites comprise roughly 13 percent of the population and form the bulk of Syria’s key military units, intelligence services, and ultra-loyalist militias, called shabiha (“ghosts” in Arabic). As the uprising in Syria drags on, there are signs that some Alawites are beginning to move away from the regime. But most continue to fight for Assad -- largely out of fear that the Sunni community will seek revenge for past and present atrocities not only against him but also against Alawites as a group. This sense of vulnerability feeding Alawite loyalty is rooted in the sect’s history.
The Alawites split from Shia Islam in ninth-century Iraq over their belief in the divinity of the fourth Islamic caliph, Ali bin Abi Talib, a position branded as heresy by the Sunnis and extremist by most Shias. The community began as a small collection of believers, and over the following centuries it suffered almost constant discrimination and several massacres at the hands of Sunni Muslims. In 1305, for example, following a clerical fatwa, Sunni Mamluks wiped out the Alawite community of the Kisrawan (modern Lebanon). As late as the mid-nineteenth century, in retaliation for the rebellion of an Alawite sheikh, the Ottomans ruthlessly persecuted the Alawites, burning villages and farms across what little territory they held.
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