LATAKIA, Syria (AP) — Syria’s minority religious and ethnic communities were divided in the runup to the first parliamentary elections after the ouster of Bashar Assad, the former Syrian president. In the end, some chose to take part in the weekend vote but few managed to break into the country’s new political order, according to preliminary results.

Latakia, an idyllic city perched on the Mediterranean coast and a summer tourist destination, is also a former stronghold of the Assad family that ruled the country for 50 years and a center of the Alawite sect — an offshoot of Shiite Islam — to which they belong.

After Assad’s ouster in December in a Sunni Islamist-led insurgent offensive, Alawites saw a stark reversal of fortunes. The army, where many of them had enlisted, collapsed and th

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