The Alawites are a sect of Shia Islam, which has its own secretive religious teachings and recognises twelve Imams (legitimate successors to the Prophet Mohammed). They have suffered a difficult history of persecution, displacement and pogroms, because some orthodox Sunnis have regarded them as infidels and heretics.
Sunni Islam is the largest sect in Islam, to which the majority of Muslims belong, and its legislation and traditions are based on the Quran and the Hadith, the teachings of the Prophet. They recognise only four Imams: the leaders of the four official schools of Sunni Islam which emerged after the death of the Prophet.
The Alawites follow the Imam Ali bin Abi Talib, the cousin of the Prophet Mohammed, and do not accept the authority of Sunni Islamic traditions. They have their own theological traditions, of which the most important is the idea of the separation of religion and state. They were known by many names before the nineteenth century, including the Nusayris, but the status of the Alawites in Syria changed when Hafez al-Assad, the father of Bashar al-Assad, came to power, because he was able to harness the community and its difficult history to his own advantage, enforcing their allegiance. Although many opponents of Hafez al-Assad were in fact Alawites and spent many years in prison under his rule, he filled the ranks of his army with them and he impoverished much of the community, forcing many of them into his security services, and corrupting some of them through positions in the army and the state. Hafez al-Assad dispensed with the important religious authorities and made use of the Alawite religion for his benefit, and for whatever helped him and his family stay in power. When the revolution began in Syria, the Alawites generally sided with Bashar al-Assad.