As an Alawite, Ziad identifies with the main markers of Islam.
“Our book is the Quran, our prophet is Muhammad, and our direction of prayer is the Kaaba in Mecca,” he said.
Ziad, a pseudonym granted because of the still-unstable situation in Syria, believes in God and called out to him during the Sunni militant attack on Alawite cities and villages in the coastal northwest. However, he does not perform the prescribed ritual prayers, fast for Ramadan, or consider a pilgrimage to Mecca necessary. And he drinks alcohol, which is forbidden for other Muslims.
Yet mainstream rejection of his sect goes far beyond these offenses. To understand why most Muslims consider Alawite beliefs heretical, we must first know a little about the religion’s main sects—Sunni and Shiite.
When Muhammad died in AD 632, disputes arose within the community over who would assume leadership. Sunnis, who today represent 85 percent of Muslims, hold that the prophet left this choice open for believers to decide. They chose Abu Bakr, an early convert and respected tribal leader, as the first caliph.
Shiites, on the other hand, hold that Muhammad designated his cousin Ali as his successor and that the tribal confederation bypassed his will. Ali was eventually chosen as the fourth caliph but assassinated within an Islamic civil war. The caliphate thereafter passed into hereditary rule. This political history matters practically little to Alawites, but they share with Shiites the belief that Ali was the first imam.
Most Shiites count a succession of 12 imams from the bloodline of Ali, whom they say God endowed with supernatural insight to interpret the Quran and Muslim religious traditions. The 12th imam is believed to have concealed himself—entering a period of what is called “occultation”—and will reappear at the end of the age.
However, Alawites follow…
This article first published at Christianity Today on June 25, 2025. Please click here to read the full text.
On March 6, Ziad nervously scoured social media, hiding in a windowless room in his apartment. He had heard gunfire, and over the long course of the civil war in Syria, he had learned how to distinguish the various weaponry. These were military-grade machine guns. Bands of balaclava-clad militants in pickup trucks shouted “Allahu Akbar” as they attacked a government office just a mile from his home in the coastal city of Lattakia.
The 46-year-old educator and his wife, Zeinab, knew the militants were looking for Alawites. The couple belonged to the heterodox Islamic sect that many Sunni Muslims in Syria hated for their connection to the deposed Assad regime. Others went further and condemned their beliefs as heretical. Medieval and Ottoman-era fatwas declared Alawites deserving of death, and videos circulated of mosques calling for jihad against their community.
Ziad did not leave his home for the next three days.
When the dust settled, the March massacre claimed the lives of at least 1,700 Alawites. Ziad, currently in Lebanon and granted anonymity to preserve the safety of his relatives in Syria, describes the terror the community experienced.
“O God, save us,” he prayed quietly. “We didn’t do anything wrong.”
Six months earlier, when Bashar al-Assad’s regime fell, Ziad hoped for a transition to democracy and wide-scale reform. Assad’s father, Hafez, seized power in a 1970 coup and disproportionately selected Alawites for key military and government posts. But few from the community truly benefited, Ziad said, while most lived in relative poverty—as in other rural regions. The regime permitted no dissent and cultivated insecurity among its minority religious populations to curb any threat to its power.
While Alawites make up a majority in the coastal plains and mountains of western Syria, the ethnoreligious group represents 10–13 percent of the overall population. Sunni Muslims and Greek Orthodox Christians live among them in peace. But as militants barged into homes, looting cell phones and cash, they killed adult Alawite males and sometimes whole families.
Ziad had barred the iron gate to their building. Perhaps this spared their lives. He and Zeinab sat in the darkness to avoid showing signs of life in their apartment. And as he scrolled Facebook for updates, he learned…
This article was first published at Christianity Today on June 24, 2025. Please click here to read the full text.
Thousands of Syrians, including large numbers of Christians, have fled from their homes, especially in the Homs and Hama governorates and more recently Damascus and Aleppo. There have been reports of the targeting of Christians by both government and opposition sides.
Several prominent Syrian Christians have been killed recently, including Defense Minister General Dawoud Rajha (assassinated in an attack on the National Security Offices in Damascus on July 18) and Brigadier-General Nabil Zougheib (assassinated along with his wife and son at their home in a Christian neighborhood of Damascus on 21st July).
Most Church leaders point out that any such targeting is not religiously motivated but is either politically motivated or is criminal activity for economic gain. Many Christians fear that radical Islamist groups are becoming more influential, and that this may lead to increased hostility towards Christians and other minorities. They fear that they may become more vulnerable to criminal activity, including kidnapping-for-ransom incidents.
Throughout the ongoing unrest, Syrian Christians have faced a dilemma of allegiance. They regard the current regime as having been a protector for many years and fear that any replacement regime is likely to prove more hostile. Yet along with others in Syria, they know that open allegiance to either the government or to the opposition could bring retaliation from the other side.
I try to keep my eye on Syria, without pretending to know what is going on, or summoning the effort required to really gain an understanding. In general, I am wary of foreign interference, suspect there is already much going on, and have unfortunately become anesthetized to the constant reports of killing. But as ruthless as the Assad regime appears, once protests evolve into armed insurrection, it is hard to take sides.
That said, I found this account interesting. Middle East Concern focuses on the state of Christians in the region, and I haven’t followed them enough to know how objective is their reporting. This one, however, reads well.
I found it interesting especially to note that one of the inner circle assassinated recently was a Christian. It is generally understood that Assad’s Shia-offshoot Alawite regime pulled other minority groups into its ruling ‘coalition’. The last paragraph presents well the state Christians now find themselves in.
I don’t envy them. Surely Christians are complicit in many of Assad’s crimes. The assassinated general’s participation in the regime was likely as a member of the Christian religious sect, rather than as a member of the Christian faith community. The line should not be drawn too finely, but it is fair to ask the question:
Strictly from the perspective of their faith, what should Christians do now?
The sect behaved politically, finding stability and security – as well as likely economic advantage – in remaining close to the Assad regime. The community may have simply accepted this as the status quo, honoring the king as the Bible commands, even when unjust. They may have paid ill attention to these issues of justice, but this is the case with Christians everywhere who are part and parcel of a nation’s fabric, as appears the case in Syria.
But now? The sect must be weighing the political advantages of remaining in Assad’s corner versus abandoning ship before it is too late. This report suggests they have adopted a stance of neutrality, which may be the wisest political course of action. There are landmines on every side, though.
The faith community, however, must be troubled further. Theirs is not a political calculation but a determination of God’s will. They must honor the king: Does Assad still qualify or is the conflict sufficiently ‘civil war’ to deny them a proper object of honor? Furthermore, does Assad’s behavior deny this categorically?
The sect must pay attention to repercussions. If the rebels win will they harbor an anti-Christian agenda? Will they exact sectarian revenge? Will they enact an Islamist agenda that limits their citizenship?
But the community should be less concerned with these issues. They must be wise, of course, but the primary importance is to do what is right. Then, if they must suffer for their choices, they do so in firm conviction God has allowed it to establish their testimony.
Ah, but what is right? This is an estimation we must leave in their hands. We can only pray they have wisdom to decide from the position of their community, and less from the position of their sect.
Jayson Casper 