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Alawites [b] are an Arab ethnoreligious group [17] who live primarily in the Levant region in West Asia and follow Alawism. [18] A sect of Islam that splintered from early Shia as a ghulat branch during the ninth century, [19] [20] [21] Alawites venerate Ali ibn Abi Talib, the "first Imam" in the Twelver school, as a manifestation of the divine essence.
The Assad regime had attempted to supplant the Alawite religious identity. Bashar al-Assad attempted to integrate Alawites into Sunni Islam as to alleviate Sunni opposition to his rule, while Hafez al-Assad entirely dismissed the Alawite faith as simply Twelver Shi'ism. Alawites insisted that they were a distinct Islamic sect, while accusing ...
Bashar al-Assad [b] (born 11 September 1965) is a Syrian politician, military officer and dictator [1] who served as the president of Syria from 2000 until his government was overthrown in the Syrian Revolution in 2024.
In the final days leading to his ouster, Syrian President Bashar al-Assad complained to Iran's foreign minister that Turkey was actively supporting Sunni rebels in their offensive to topple him ...
The conflict's sectarian edge was hardened by the arrival of Iranian-backed Shi'ite fighters from across the Middle East to support Assad, and as Sunni Muslim-led states including Turkey and Qatar ...
DAMASCUS (Reuters) -Damascus stirred back to life on Monday at the start of a hopeful but uncertain era after rebels seized the capital and President Bashar al-Assad fled to Russia, following 13 ...
When Hafez al-Assad came to power in 1971 with the Corrective Movement, the army began to modernize and change. In the first 10 years of Assad's rule, the army increased by 162%, and by 264% by 2000. At one point, 70% of the country's GDP went only to the army. On 6 October 1973, Syria and Egypt initiated the Yom Kippur War against Israel.
The Sunni Muslims make up the vast majority in the country, mainly of the Hanafi and Shafi'i madhhabs. The Alawites are the biggest Muslim minority sect (10% of the country's population [2]), followed by Isma'ili and Twelver Shia Muslims, which constitute about 3% percent of the country's population. [3]