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The number of Muslims in Lebanon has been disputed for many years. There has been no official census in Lebanon since 1932. According to the CIA World Factbook , [ 19 ] the Muslim population is estimated at around 59.5% [ 20 ] within the Lebanese territory and of the 8.6 [ 21 ] –14 [ 22 ] million Lebanese diaspora is believed by some to be ...
Lebanon is an eastern Mediterranean country that has the most religiously diverse society within the Middle East, recognizing 18 religious sects. [2] [3] The recognized religions are Islam (Sunni, Shia, Alawites, and Isma'ili), Druze, Christianity (the Maronite Church, the Greek Orthodox Church, the Melkite Greek Catholic Church, evangelical Protestantism, the Armenian Apostolic Church, the ...
Shari'a, which applies to personal status matters of Muslims, forbids the marriage of a non-Muslim male to a Muslim woman. Druze religious leaders will perform marriages only of Druze couples. There are no procedures for civil marriage; however, the Government recognizes civil marriage ceremonies performed outside the country.
Today, Islam is the region's dominant religion, being adhered to by at least 90% of the population in every Middle Eastern country except for Jewish-majority Israel, religiously diverse Lebanon and Christian-majority Cyprus. [4] Muslims constitute 18% of the total Israeli population, ~45% of the Lebanese population (estimates vary) and 25% of ...
Christians were half of Lebanon's population before the Lebanese Civil War (1975–1990), but in 2012 they are believed to form a large minority of 40.5% [114] of the country's population (according to the last official Lebanese Census of 1932, the Lebanese Christian population was 51% [115] of the country's population).
The earliest sense of a modern Lebanese identity is to be found in the writings of historians in the early nineteenth century, when, under the emirate of the Shihabs, a Lebanese identity emerged "separate and distinct from the rest of Syria, bringing the Maronites and Druzes, along with its other Christian and Muslim sects, under one government ...
As the last Lebanese census was conducted in 1932, it is difficult to have precise population estimates. Lebanon has the highest proportion of Christians of any country in the Middle East, but exact size of this population has been disputed for many years. One estimate of the Christian share of Lebanon's population, as of 2012, was 40.5%. [19]
The sectarian balance was again adjusted towards the Muslim side but simultaneously further reinforced and legitimized. Shia Muslims (by now the second largest sect) then gained additional representation in the state apparatus, and the obligatory Christian-Muslim representation in Parliament was downgraded from a 6:5 to a 1:1 ratio. Christians ...