Discontent among Alawites — the minority sect that forms the regime’s core constituency — as well as Druse and other religious minorities is at its highest since 2012, when dozens of Mr. Assad’s senior military and security officials left the government. Last summer, simmering tensions reportedly boiled over when gun battles erupted between Iranian-backed regime forces and residents of two Alawite villages outside Hama. In September, Druse protesters and paramilitaries overtook a government building in the southern province of Sweida and even destroyed a statue of Hafez al-Assad, Mr. Assad’s father.
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