Islam in Syria

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Islam in Syria is composed of a Sunni majority and four minority Shia sects; Alawi, Druze, Ismailis, and Twelver Shiites. In March 1963 a military coup installed a secular, socialist regime with an Alawi ruler (former president Hafez al-Assad; his son Bashar is the current president). The most intractable challenge to Baathist rule has come from Islamic groups, most notably, the Muslim Brotherhood. The first Islamic uprising was in 1964 in Hama; other sectarian disturbances followed in 1967. Discontent lay mainly in the cities, as rural areas had witnessed unprecedented economic progress under the Baathists, and Syria's religious minorities - Druze, Alawis, Christians, and Ismailis - were unsympathetic to Islamist aspirations. Insurrections by Islamic groups between 1979 and 1982 were quelled violently, with Hafez al-Assad's regime demanding a strict separation from politics.