Within Syria

Of course I can't write a single word about my sect without someone from the Syria opposition showing up to curse me, my mother and my sect ... And western thing we should live with these sectarian monstershttps://twitter.com/IdlibObserver/status/1059844257203265537 …

19-Now as this thread is over, I will welcome any of your questions, just link them to this tweet, or you can send me a DM.

18-Did anyone try to Genocide the Alawites? Yes, only one side tried and these were the Ottmans, as far as I know they tried many time. Despite winning some battles and besieging us in the mountains for more than 300 years, the failed to kill us all.

-- All of these wars were purely political and based on a conflict of interests and northing more, but people manipulate the history and fall to the lies and narrative of the rulers.

-- If Sunnis wanted to genocide Alawites they would have done this in the 15th century and no one would have cared. Alawites had many other wars with Ismalists, Shiite and Kurds, but no one ever talk about these --

17-Sunnis tried to genocide Alawites? No, all the Alawite-Sunni conflicts in the history were purely political, and they were given a religious aspect to encourage common people to fight, like what we are seeing today --

-- Prior to this war, as things were getting better, people started to work in other fields, I remember people used to laugh at me just because I used to say that I would like to work as a translator for the army, so this trend even ended before the war.

16- Since the 70s Alawites join the authorities as a part of a plan to keep the country under their control? No, if you believe this you have some serious racism problems, Alawites joined the army and intelligence simply because they were among the poorest people of Syria --

15-Alawites are privileged? No, we are not even recognized by the government, so there is no easy way to tell who is Alawite and then to treat him better. The officials who are willing to give people privileges, they give it to people who can pay regardless of their believes.

14-Alawite Sheikhs have political influence? No, actually in our sect politics are fully separated from religious ideas. A Sheikh who promote a political view is looked at as a bad Sheikh and a hypocrite. That’s why Alawites don’t have religious leaders like all other sects here.

13-Politically: All Alawites are Ba’athist? No, only a minority of Alawites are Ba’athists, the rest some believe in Arab nationalism away from Ba’ath and a big part believe in Syrian nationalism, the biggest stronghold of Ba’ath in Syria is the province of Daraa!

12-Alwites hates Sunnis? No, many Alawites have a phobia of Sunnis due many crimes -by Ottmans and later Muslim Brotherhood- and this don’t mean they hate them and want to kill them, this is only fear, which is actually declining despite of this war!

11-Alawites are a war-like sect? Yes we are, we proudly fought to defend our self in the past and we will continue to do so, this is a very basic right and we take pride in the fact that we always defended ourselves.

10-Alawites have pagan traditions? Yes we do, and that’s something that I’m very proud of, as it represent thousands of years of culture, sadly most of them are dead now, but we still set a big fire now and then, like the Sunni residents of Arwad island and local Christens.

9-There is Kurdish Alawites? I made a very deep search on this, and the sure answer is No, there is no Kurdish Alawites, but there is Kurdish Alevis in Syria.

8-Turkish Alevis are the same as Alawites? No, we are not the same, our sect was founded in the 9th century, theirs in the 14th century, we have similar names and we are both syncretic, so people think we are the same, which is wrong.

7-Alawites are Arabs? No, Alawites like all Syrians are a mix, a part of us are Arabs, others are from local backgrounds, like Assyrians, Arabians, Jewish, Romanian and even Egyptians!

-- There is no more tribal leaders, most of these leaders were kicked out of Syria with their families to other countries like France. In general, this concept is dead for us.

6-Culturally: Alawites are divide into tribes? Yes, Alawites have many tribes, but the concept of Tribal loyalty was eliminated in 30 after an “Alawite Awakening,” today talking about this is unacceptable --

5-Is there Radical Alawites? Yes there is, like in any other religious group around the world, and yes they thing that they are better than everyone else including other Alawites, but we are lucky they are a very small minority.