Everyone in Turkey agrees that one of the most vital issues facing the country is the situation of Alevis. It is a top-priority societal issue that has to be handled with urgency.

Alevis constitute the country's largest minority, estimated between 12 and 15 million people. Given Turkey’s population of 76 million, this is a significant number. In short, Alevis are generally considered to be a part of Islam, with a syncretic and esoteric belief system that has incorporated many pre-Islam tenets of Anatolia. Only a tiny minority of Alevis see themselves outside of Islam. Although some of the beliefs of the Anatolian Alevis resemble doctrines of Shiite Islam, their roots are not the same. Almost none of the tenets of Sharia are accepted by Alevis. Recognized as a branch of Shiism, Arab Alawites in southern Turkey are known as Nusayris. Almost all of Turkish Nusayris have relatives in Syria. In today’s Turkey, when we say Alevis, it covers all the Turkish, Kurdish and Arab Alawites.

Turkey experienced violent Alevi-Sunni clashes in its recent history. The "deep state" actors now being tried in the Ergenekon coup-plotting case were accused of organizing the Alevi massacres. The 1938 Dersim massacre was organized directly by the Kemalist regime. Single-party rule of the Republican People's Party (CHP) collectively massacred Kurdish Alevis in the Dersim region that they had marked as "potential terrorists."

It is still debated whether the order for the massacre was ordered by then-President Mustafa Kemal Ataturk or the CHP’s second man Ismet Inonu. Generally, Inonu is accused, but we have to remember that Ataturk is still the grand taboo of Turkey, immune to criticism. That is why Turkey’s liberals and conservatives declared Inonu the scapegoat. Strangely, the CHP, which carried out the Dersim massacre, is today led by Kemal Kilicdaroglu, himself a Kurdish Alevi from Dersim.