Sunni Muslims and Alawites have been in conflict with each other for centuries. The Alawites of the Levant were oppressed by the Sunni Ottoman Empire, but gained power and influence when the French recruited Alawites as soldiers during the French Mandate of Syria. After independence from France, their co-religionists came to power in Syria in 1966 (represented by the al-Assad family since 1970). This angered some of the Sunni majority of Syria, which reacted with an Islamist uprising in Syria, an insurgency which was crushed by the 1982 Hama massacre.