The Alawi Capture of Power in Syria

23 Pages·2009·0.65 MB·English

The Alawi Capture of Power in Syria
Author(s): Daniel Pipes
Source: Middle Eastern Studies, Vol. 25, No. 4 (Oct., 1989), pp. 429-450
Published by: Taylor & Francis, Ltd.
Stable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/4283331 .
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The Alawi Capture of Power in Syria
Daniel Pipes
For manyc enturies,t he Alawisw ere the weakest,p oorest, most rural,m ost
despiseda ndm ost backwardp eople of Syria.I n recenty ears, however,t hey
have transformedt hemselves into the ruling elite of Damascus. Today,
Alawis dominate the government, hold key military positions, enjoy a
disproportionates hare of the educational resources, and are becoming
wealthy. How did this dramatic change occur? When did the Alawis
managet o escape their traditionalc onfines, and what was the mechanism
of their rise?
Sunnisa nd others unsympathetict o the regime of Hafiz al-Asad answer
this question by accusing the Alawis of an elaborate and long-term
conspiracyt o take power in Syria.A nnie Laurents uggestst hat 'determined
to get their revenge'a fter the failureo f a rebel leader, SulaymanM urshid,
'the Alawis put into effect a strategyo f setting up cells in the armya nd the
Ba'thP arty,a ndt his won themp oweri n Damascus'. Adherentso f this view
date the Alawi ascent to 1959, the year that the MilitaryC ommitteeo f the
Ba'th Partyw as formed. Why, they ask, did leaders of this group keep its
existence secret from the party authorities?T his furtivenesss uggests that
the MilitaryC ommitteef rom the beginningh ad a sectariana genda. Matti
Moosa arguedt hat 'it is almost certaint hat the officersw ere acting not as
Baathists,b ut as Nusayris[ Alawis], with the intent of using the Baath and
the armed forces to rise to power in Syria. The formationo f the military
committee was the beginning of their plan for a future takeover of the
government'.2
This speculationi s confirmedb y the 1960 clandestinem eeting of Alawi
religiousl eaders and officers (includingA sad) that reportedlyt ook place
in Qardaha,A sad's home town. 'The maing oal of this meetingw as to plan
how to forwardt he Nusayrio fficersi nto the rankso f the Ba'th Party.T hey
would then exploit it as a means to arrivea t the rule in Syria'.3T hree years
later, anotherA lawi meetingi n Homs is said to have followedu p the earlier
initiatives.A mong other steps, it calledf or the placemento f more Alawisi n
the Ba'th Partya nd army. Furthers ecret meetingso f Alawi leaders appear
to have taken place later in the 1960s.4
Analysts better disposed to Asad tend to discountn ot just these meet-
ings and a premeditatedd rive for power, but the sectarianf actor more
generally. John F. Devlin, for example, denies that the disproportiono f
Alawis in the army implies Alawi dominance of Syria. He would resist
seeing 'every domesticd isagreementi n terms of a Sunni-Alawic lash'. For
him, the fact that Alawis are in power is basicallya ccidental:' The Ba'th is
430 MIDDLE EASTERNS TUDIES
a secularp arty, and it is heavy with minorities'.5A lasdairD rysdalec alls it
'reductionistt'o focus on ethnicity,a rguingt hat this is one of manyf actors-
geography,c lass, age, education,o ccupation- that define the rulinge lite.6
Accordingt o Yahya M. Sadowski,' sectarianl oyalties play an insignificant
role in the Ba'th, and even confessionalb onds are only one among many
avenues by whichp atronagei s extended'.7
The truthl ies between conspiracya nd accident.T he Alawis did not 'plan
for a future takeover' years in advance, nor was it mere chance that the
Ba'th Party was 'heavy with minorities'. Alawi power resulted from an
unplanned but sectarian transformationo f public life in Syria. Michael
van Dusen explains: 'From 1946 to 1963, Syria witnessed the gradual
erosion of the national and eventually subnational political power of
the traditional elite, not so much through the emergence of new and
especiallyd ynamice lites but ratherb y internalc onflict'.8T ranslatedf rom
the jargon of political science, van Dusen is saying that internald ivisions
caused non-Ba'thc ivilianS unnis to lose power. This provideda n opening
that Ba'thisto fficerso f Alawi originse xploited.
How these processes occurredi s my subject here. First, however, some
backgroundo n the Alawis and their place in traditionalS yrian society,
followed by a sketch of their ascent.
THE ALAWI HERESYT O 1920
People and Faith
'Alawi' is the term that Alawis (also called Alawites) usually apply to
themselves;b ut until 1920t hey were knownt o the outsidew orlda s Nusayris
or Ansaris.T he changei n name- imposedb y the Frenchu pon theirs eizure
of control in Syria - has significance.W hereas 'Nusayri'e mphasizest he
group's differencesf rom Islam, 'Alawi' suggests an adherent of Ali (the
son-in-law of the Prophet Muhammad) and accentuates the religion's
similaritiest o Shi'i Islam.9 Consequently,o pponents of the Asad regime
habituallyu se the formert erm, supporterso f the regime use the latter.
Alawis todayn umbera pproximately1 .3 million,o f whom abouta million
live in Syria. They constitute some 12 per cent of the Syrianp opulation.
Three-quarteros f the SyrianA lawis live in Latakia,a provincei n the north-
west of Syria, where they make up almost two-thirdso f the population.
Alawi doctrinesd ate from the ninthc enturya nd derive from the Twelver
or Imami branch of Shi'i Islam (the sect that predominatesi n Iran). In
about 859, one Ibn Nusayr declared himself the bab ('gatewayt o truth'),
a key figure in Shi'i theology. On the basis of this authority, Ibn Nusayr
proclaimeda host of new doctrines10w hich, to cut a long story short, make
Alawismi nto a separater eligion. Accordingt o Ibn Kathir( d. 1372), where
THE ALAWI CAPTUREO F POWERI N SYRIA 431
Muslimsp roclaimt heir faith with the phrase: 'There is no deity but God
and Muhammadis His prophet',A lawis assert' Therei s no deity but Ali, no
veil but Muhammad,a nd no bab but Salman'.11A lawis reject Islam'sm ain
tenets; by almost any standardt hey must be consideredn on-Muslims.
Some Alawi doctrines appear to derive from Phoenician paganism,
Mazdakism and Manichism. But by far the greatest affinity is with
Christianity.A lawi religiousc eremoniesi nvolve bread and wine; indeed,
wine drinkingh as a sacred role in Alawism, for it representsG od.12T he
religion holds Ali, the fourth caliph, to be the (Jesus-like)i ncarnationo f
divinity.13I t has a holy trinity,c onsistingo f Muhammad,A li, and Salman
al-Farisi,a freed slave of Muhammad's.A lawis celebrate many Christian
festivals, includingC hristmas,N ew Year's Day on 1 January,E piphany,
Easter, Pentecost and Palm Sunday. They honor many Christians aints:
St. Catherine, St. Barbara, St. George, St. John the Baptist, St. John
Chrysostom,a nd St. Mary Magdalene. The Arabic equivalents of such
Christian personal names as Gabriel, John, Matthew, Catherine and
Helen are in common use. And, Alawis tend to show more friendliness
to Christianst han to Muslims.
For these reasons, many observers- missionariese specially- have sus-
pected the Alawis of a secret Christianp roclivity.E ven T. E. Lawrence
described them as 'those disciples of a cult of fertility, sheer pagan,
anti-foreign, distrustfulo f Islam, drawn at moments to Christianityb y
commonp ersecution'.14T he Jesuit scholarH enri Lammensu nequivocally
concludedf rom his researcht hat 'the Nusayrisw ere Christians'a nd their
practicesc ombine Christianw ith Shi'i elements.15
The specifics of the Alawi faith are hidden not just from outsidersb ut
even from the majority of the Alawis themselves. In contrast to Islam,
which is premised on direct relations between God and the individual
believer, Alawism permitso nly males born of two Alawi parentst o learn
the religiousd octrines.W hen deemed trustworthyt, hese are initiatedi nto
some of the rites at 16 to 20 years of age; other mysteries are revealed
later and only gradually.R eligious secrecy is strictlym aintained,o n pain
of death and being incarnatedi nto a vile animal.W hethert he lattert hreat
is made good, mortals cannot judge; but the first certainlyi s. Thus, the
most renowneda postate from Alawism, SulaymanE fendi al-Adhani,w as
assassinatedf or divulgingt he sect's mysteries.E ven more impressive,a t a
time of sectariant ension in the mid-1960s,t he suggestiont hat the Alawi
officers who ran the country publish the secret books of their religion
caused Salah Jadid to respond with horror, saying that, were this done,
the religiousl eaders 'wouldc rushu s'.16
Women do most of the hard labor; they are prized 'preciselyb ecause
of the work they do that men will not do except grudgingly,f inding it
incompatiblew ith their dignity'.17W omena re never inductedi nto the mys-
teries ('Would you have us teach them whom we use, our holy faith?');18
432 MIDDLE EASTERNS TUDIES
indeed, theiru ncleanlinessr equirest heire xclusionf rom all religiousr ituals.
Femalesa re thoughtt o retaint he paganc ult of worshippingt rees, meadows
and hills, and to have no souls.19I n all, femalesa re treateda bominably;b ut
one consequenceo f this disrespecti s that they need not be veiled and enjoy
greaterf reedom of movementt han Muslimw omen.
Unveiled women and several other Alawi practices - in particular,
permittingw ine drinking, and holding some ceremonies at night - long
excited Muslims uspicionsa bout Alawi behavior.T hen too, the obsessive
secrecy inherentt o the religions uggestedt o many Sunnist hat the Alawis
had somethingt o hide. But what? Over the centuries,t he Sunnis'i magina-
tions supplieda highlye vocative answer:s exual abandona nd perversion.
Thus, the theologiana l-Ash'ari( 874-936) held that Alawisme ncourages
male sodomy and incestuous marriages,a nd the founder of the Druze
religious doctrine, Hamza ibn Ali (d. 1021), wrote that Alawis consider
'the male member entering the female nature to be the emblem of their
spirituald octrine'.20A ccordingly,A lawi men freely share their wives with
co-religionistsT. hese and other accusationss urvivedu ndiminishedth rough
the centuriesa nd even circulateda mongE uropeans.21A Britisht ravelero f
the early 1840s, who was probablyr epeatingl ocal rumors,w rote that 'the
institutiono f marriagei s unknown.W hen a young man grows up he buys
his wife'.22E ven Alawis believed in the 'conjugal communism'o f their
religious leaders.23S uch calumnies remain a mainstayo f the anti-Alawi
propagandac irculatingi n Syriat oday.
Although the charges are false, Alawis do reject Islam's sacred law,
the Shari'a, and therefore indulge in all manner of activities that Islamic
doctrines trictlyf orbids. Alawis ignore Islamic sanitaryp ractices, dietary
restrictions,s exual mores and religious rituals. Likewise, they pay little
attention to the fasting, almsgiving,a nd pilgrimagec eremonies of Islam;
indeed, they consider the pilgrimaget o Mecca a form of idol worship.
'Spiritualm arriages'b etween young (male) initiates and their religious
mentorsp robablyl ie at the root of chargeso f homosexuality.
Most strikingo f all, Alawis have no prayerso r places of worship;i ndeed,
they have no religious structureso ther than tomb shrines. Prayers take
place in privateh ouses, usuallyt hose of religiousl eaders. The fourteenth-
centuryt ravelerI bn Battutad escribedh ow they respondedt o a government
decree orderingt he constructiono f mosques:' Everyv illage built a mosque
far from their houses, whicht he villagersn eithere nter nor maintain.T hey
often shelter cattle and asses in it. Often a strangera rrivesa nd goes to the
mosque to recite the [Islamic]c all to prayer;t hen they yell to him, "Stop
braying, your fodder is coming". 24 Five centuries later another attempt
was made to build mosques for the Alawis, this time by the Ottoman
authorities;d espite officialp ressure,t hese were deserted, abandonede ven
by the religiousf unctionaries,a nd once again used as barns.
Beyond specific divergences,n on-conformityt o the Shari'am eans that
THE ALAWI CAPTURE OF POWER IN SYRIA 433
Alawi life follows its own rhythms, fundamentallyu nlike those of other
Muslims. Alawis do not act like Sunni Muslims; rather, they resemble
Christians and Jews in pursuing a wholly distinct way of life. Moosa
notes that, 'like the other extremist Shi'ites ... the Nusayris had total
disregardf or Muslimr eligiousd uties'.25I gnaz Goldziherp uts it succinctly:
'This religion is Islam only in appearance'.26It is importantt o make this
point very clear: Alawis have never been, and are not now, Muslims.
Yet, as Ibn Battuta'sa ccounts uggests,t here is a permanenti nconsistency
in the Alawi wish to be seen as Muslim. In his case, it was mosques built
and then neglected; at other times it is some other half-hearteda doption
of Islamic ways. Alawis have a long history of claiming Islam when this
suits their needs and ignoringi t at other times. In short, like other sects
of Shi'i origins,A lawis practicet aqiya( religiousd issimulation).T his might
mean, for example, prayings ide by side with Sunni Muslimsb ut silently
cursingt he Sunnic aliphs.T he apostateA lawi, SulaymanE fendi al-Adhani,
recountedh avingb een swornt o dissimulatea bouth is religion'sm ysteries.27
An Alawi saying explains the sentiment behind taqiya : 'We are the body
and other sects are but clothing. However a man dresses does not change
him. So we remain always Nusayris,e ven though we externallya dopt the
practiceso f our neighbors. Whoever does not dissimulatei s a fool, for
no intelligentp erson goes naked in the market'.28A nother Alawi phrase
expresses this sentiment succinctly:' Dissimulationi s our righteous war!'
(al-kitmanj ihadna).29
A Britisht ravelero bserved in 1697 that the Alawis are:
of a strange and singularc haracter.F or 'tis their principlet o adhere
to no certain religion; but camelion-like, they put on the colour of
religion, whatever it be, which is reflected upon them from the
persons with whom they happen to converse. ... No body was ever
able to discover what shape or standardt heir consciences are really
of. All that is certain concerningt hem is, that they make much and
good wine, and are great drinkers.30
A hundreda nd fifty years later, BenjaminD israeli describedt he Alawis in
a conversationi n the novel Tancred:
Are they Moslemin?
It is very easy to say what they are not, and that is about the extent
of any knowledge we have of them; they are not Moslemin, they
are not Christian,t hey are not Druzes, and they are not Jews, and
certainlyt hey are not Guebres [Zoroastrians].31
Al-Adhanie xplainedt his flexibilityf rom within:
They take on the outwardp racticeso f all sects. If they meet [Sunni]
Muslims,t hey sweart o them and say, 'We are like you, we fast andw e
434 MIDDLE EASTERNS TUDIES
pray'.B ut they fast improperly.I f they enter a mosquew ith Muslims,
they do not recite any of the prayers;i nstead, they lower and raise
their bodies like Muslims,w hile cursingA bu Bakr, Umar, Uthman,
and other [majorf igureso f the Sunnit radition].32
Taqiyap ermitedA lawis to blow with the wind. When Francer uled, they
portrayedt hemselvesa s lost Christians.W hen Pan-Arabismw as in favor,
they became fervent Arabs.33 Over 10,000 Alawis living in Damascus
pretended to be Sunnis in the years before Asad came to power, only
revealingt heir true identitiesw hen this became politicallyu seful.34D uring
Asad's presidency,c oncerted efforts were made to portrayt he Alawis as
TwelverS hi'is.
Relationsw ithS unnis
MainstreamM uslims,S unnia nd Shi'ia like, traditionallyd isregardedA lawi
efforts at dissimulation;t hey viewed Alawis as beyond the pale of Islam-
as non-Muslims.H amza ibn Ali, who saw the religion'sa ppeal lying in its
perversity,a rticulatedt his view: 'The first thing that promotest he wicked
Nusayrii s the fact that all thingsn ormallyp rohibitedt o humans- murder,
stealing, lying, calumny,f ornication,p ederasty- is permittedt o he or she
who accepts [Alawi doctrines]'.35A bu Hamid al-Ghazali( 1058-1111), the
ThomasA quinas of Islam, wrote that the Alawis 'apostatizei n matterso f
blood, money, marriage,a nd butchering,s o it is a duty to kill them'.36
Ahmad ibn Taymiya( 1268-1328),t he still highlyi nfluentialS unniw riter
of Syriano rigins, wrote in a fatwa (religious decision) that 'the Nusayris
are more infidel than Jews or Christians,e ven more infidel than many
polytheists.T hey have done greaterh armt o the communityo f Muhammad
than have the warringi nfidels such as the Franks, the Turks, and others.
To ignorantM uslimst hey pretend to be Shi'is, though in reality they do
not believe in God or His prophet or His book'. Ibn Taymiya warned
of the mischief their enmity can do: 'Whenever possible, they spill the
blood of Muslims. .. They are alwayst he worst enemies of the Muslims'.
In conclusion, he argued that 'war and punishmenti n accordancew ith
Islamic law against them are among the greatest of pious deeds and the
most importanto bligations'f or a Muslim.37F rom the fourteenthc entury
on, Sunnisu sed the term 'Nusayri't o mean pariah.
Alawis had had no recognizedp osition in the millet (sectarian)s ystem
of the OttomanE mpire. An Ottomand ecree from 1571 notes that ancient
custom requiredA lawis to pay extra taxes to the authoritiesa nd justified
this on the grounds that Alawis 'neither practice the fast [of Ramadan]
nor the ritual prayers, nor do they observe any precepts of the Islamic
religion'.38S unniso ften saw food producedb y Alawis as unclean, and did
not eat it. Accordingt o JacquesW eulersse, 'no Alawi would dare enter a
THE ALAWI CAPTURE OF POWERI N SYRIA 435
Muslimm osque. Formerly,n ot one of their religiousl eadersw as able to go
to town on the day of public prayer[ Friday]w ithout risk of being stoned.
Any public demonstrationo f the community'ss eparatei dentityw as taken
as a challenge[ by the Sunnis]'.39
Sunnisw ere not alone in readingA lawis out of Islam- mainstreamS hi'is
did likewise. And Alawis in turn saw both groupsa s deficient.
Sunnih eresiographeres xcoriatedA lawi beliefs andv iewedt he Alawis
as disbelievers (kuffar) and idolators (mushrikun). Twelver Shi'i
heresiographersw ere only slightlyl ess vituperativea nd regardedt he
Alawis as ghulat, 'those who exceed' all boundsi n their deificationo f
Ali. The Alawis, in turn, held TwelverS hi'is to be muqassira,' those
who fall short' of fathomingA li's divinity.40
There was one exception to this consensust hat Alawis are not Muslims.
Towardt he end of the nineteenthc entury,a s Christianm issionariesb egan
taking an interest in the Alawis, Ottoman authoritiest ried to bring them
into Islam. The French alreadyh ad special ties to their fellow Catholics,
the Maronites,a nd the authoritiesi n Istanbulf eared a similarb ond being
createdw ith the Alawis. So they built mosquesi n the Alawi areas, schools
to teach Islam,p ressedA lawi religiousl eaderst o adoptS unnip ractices,a nd
generallyt ried to make the Alawis act like proper Muslims.T his isolated
case of Sunnisr eachingo ut to Alawis came to an end after a few decades
and had very little impacto n Alawi behavior.
The Islamic religion reserves a special hostility for Alawis. Like other
post-Islamic sects (such as the Baha'is and Ahmadis), they are seen
to contradict the key Islamic tenet that God's last revelation went to
Muhammad, and this Muslims find utterly unacceptable. Islamic law
acknowledgest he legitimacy of Judaism and Christianityb ecause those
religionsp receded Islam; accordingly,J ews and Christiansm ay maintain
their faiths. But Alawis are denied this privilege. Indeed, the preceptso f
Islam call for apostatesl ike the Alawis to be sold into slaveryo r executed.
In the nineteenth century, a Sunni shaykh, Ibrahima l-Maghribi,i ssued a
fatwa to the effect that Muslimsm ay freely take Alawi propertya nd lives;
and a Britisht ravelerr ecordsb eing told, 'these Ansayrii,i t is better to kill
one than to pray a whole day'.41
Frequentlyp ersecuted- some 20,000 were massacredi n 1317 and half
that number in 151642- the Alawis insulated themselves geographically
from the outside world by stayingw ithin their own ruralr egions. Jacques
Weulerssee xplainedt heir predicament:
Defeated and persecuted, the heterodox sects disappearedo r, to
survive, renouncedp roselytism .... The Alawis silently entrenched
themselves in their mountains.... Isolated in rough country, sur-
roundedb y a hostile population,h enceforthw ithoutc ommunications
with the outside world, the Alawis began to live out their solitary
436 MIDDLE EASTERNS TUDIES
existence in secrecy and repression.T heir doctrine, entirelyf ormed,
evolved no further.43
E.Janot describedt he problem: 'Bullied by the Turks, victim of a deter-
mined ostracism,f leeced by his Musliml andlord,t he Alawi hardlyd ared
leave his mountain region, where isolation and poverty itself protected
him'.44I n the late 1920s, less than half of one per cent lived in towns: just
771 Alawis out of a populationo f 176,285.45I n 1945, just 56 Alawis were
recordedl ivingi n Damascus46(t houghm any others may have been hiding
their identity). For good reason, 'the name Nusayri became synonymous
with peasant'.47T he few Alawis who did live away from their mountain
routinely practicedt aqiya. Even today, Alawis dominate the rural areas
of Latakiab ut make up only 11 per cent of the residentsi n that region's
capitalc ity.
Centurieso f hostility took their toll on the Alawi psyche. In addition
to praying for the damnation of their Sunni enemies, Alawis attacked
outsiders.T hey acquireda reputationa s fierce and unrulym ountainp eople
who resisted paying the taxes they owed the authoritiesa nd frequently
plunderedS unniv illagerso n the plains.J ohnL ewisB urckhardot bservedi n
1812t hat those villagers' hold the Anzeyrys[ Ansaris]i n contemptf or their
religion, and fear them, becauset hey often descend from the mountainsi n
the night, cross the Aaszy ['Asi, or Orontes River], and steal, or carryo ff
by force, the cattle of the valley'.48
Matterss eemed to be even worse in 1860w hen SamuelL yde added that
'nothingi s thought of thus killing a Mussulmana s a naturale nemy, or a
Christiana s an unclean thing'.49W riting about the same time, a British
travel-guidew riterw arned of the cool reception to be expected from the
Alawis: 'They are a wild and somewhats avage race, given to plunder,a nd
even bloodshed,w hen theirp assionsa re excited or suspicionr oused'.W ith
wonderfulu nderstatementt, he guide authorc oncluded,' theirc ountrym ust
thereforeb e traversedw ith caution'.50
Alawis retreated to the mountains because of persecution; they then
remainedt here, shielded from the world at large, lackingp olitical power
beyond their region's confines, isolated from the larger polities around
them, almost outside the bounds of historicalc hange. The survivalw ell
into the twentieth century of archaic practices made the Alawi region,
accordingt o Weulersse, a 'fossile country'.L ittle changedi n that country
because 'it is not the Mountaint hat is humanized;m an, rather, is made
savage'.A lawis suffereda s a result:' the refuget hey had conqueredb ecame
a prison;t houghm asterso f the Mountaint hey could not leave'.51
Governments had difficulty subduing the Alawi territory; indeed, it
only came under Ottoman control in the late 1850s. Pacificationo f the
region then led to Sunni economic inroadsa nd the formationo f an Alawi
underclass.A s badlye ducatedp easantsl ackingi n politicalo rganizationo r
THE ALAWI CAPTURE OF POWERI N SYRIA 437
militarys trength,A lawis typicallyw orked farmsb elongingt o Sunni Arab
landlords,r eceivingb ut a fifth of the produce.O ttomana gentsw ould often
exact double or triple the taxes due in the Latakiar egion.
Alawis were so badly off after the First World War that many of the
youth left their homelandt o work elsewhere. Sons left to find meniall abor
or to join the armedf orces. Daughtersw ent off at the age of seven or eight
years to work as domesticsf or urbanS unni Arabs. Because many of them
also ended up as concubines( one estimateh olds that a quartero f all Alawi
children in the 1930s and 1940s had Sunni fathers),52b oth Muslims and
Alawis saw this practice as deeply shameful. Some daughtersw ere even
sold. It is no exaggerationt o say, as one indigenoush istoriand oes, that
Alawis 'were among the poorest of the East'.53T he Reverend Samuel
Lyde went even further, writingi n 1860 that 'the state of [Alawi] society
is a perfect hell upon earth'.54
The political effects of povertyw ere exacerbatedb y the natureo f these
divisions,w hichf ollowedg eographica nd communall ines. Sunnisw ho lived
in the towns enjoyed a muchg reaterw ealtha nd dominatedt he Alawi peas-
ants. Weulersse describedi n 1934 how each community' lives apart with
its own customsa nd its own laws. Not only are they differentb ut they are
hostile . . . the idea of mixed marriagesa ppearst o be inconceivable'.55In
1946, he added that 'the antagonismb etween urbana nd ruralp eople goes
so deep that one can almost speak of two differentp opulationsc o-existing
within one political framework'.56A generationl ater, Nikolaos van Dam
observed, 'Urban-ruralc ontrastsw ere sometimes so great that the cities
seemed like settlementso f aliensw ho spongedo n the poverty-strickenru ral
population.... In the course of time, the Alawi communityd eveloped a
strong distrusto f the Sunnis who had so often been their oppressors.'57
This Alawi resentmento f Sunnish as proved enormouslyc onsequentiali n
recent years.
THE RISE OF THE ALAWIS, 1920-70
The Alawis' ascent took place over the course of half a century. In 1920,
they were still the lowly minorityj ust described;b y 1970, they firmlyr uled
Syria. This stunningt ransformationto ok place in three stages: the French
mandate( 1920-46), the period of Sunnid ominance( 1946-63), and the era
of Alawi consolidation( 1963-70).
The FrenchM andate,1 920-46
Accordingt o Yusuf al-Hakim, a prominentS yrianp olitician, the Alawis
adopted a pro-French attitude even before the French conquest of
Damascus in July 1920. 'The Alawis saw themselves in a state of grace
after hell; accordingly,t hey were dedicated to the French mandate and