Saddam & Assad friendly toward Christians

Submitted by Eliyahu (Israel), Mar 10, 2013 at 16:00

Daniel is right of course. But the reason, more obviously in Saddam's case, was that the Christians were too few to be considered a threat to him. On the other hand, Saddam oppressed the Shiites, the majority in Iraq whereas Saddam himself was a Sunni. He also persecuted Kurds who wanted independence or at least autonomy. Which he could not accept as a pan-Arab nationalist.

The same goes for Hafez Assad with the additional factor that Assad was an Alawite, an offshoot of the Shi'ah, facing a Sunni Arab majority and considered it useful for the non-Sunni and non- Arabs [about 40% of the population?] to stay together against a Sunni attempt to rise up.

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