Location: Lebanon 🌎

Lebanon is an eastern Mediterranean country that has the most religiously diverse society within the Middle East, comprising 18 recognized religious sects. The religions are Islam (Sunni, Shia, and a small number of Alawites and Ismailis) and Christianity (the Maronite Church, the Greek Orthodox Church, the Melkite Greek Catholic Church, Protestantism, the Armenian Apostolic Church). The Druze concern around an estimate of 5% of the citizens in Lebanon. Furthermore, outside of Lebanon, Lebanese people (including diaspora) are mostly Christians. It is also estimated that a large proportion of its population are refugees (1.5 million out of a bit over 6 million in 2017), which affects statistics. The refugees, who mostly are of Syrian or Palestinian origin, are predominantly Sunni Muslim, hence also include Christians and Shia Muslims.Lebanon differs from other Middle East countries where Muslims have become the majority after the civil war, and somewhat resembles Bosnia-Herzegovina and Albania; both in Southeastern Europe, in having a diverse mix of Muslims and Christians that each make up a large proportion of the country’s population. Christians were once a majority inside Lebanon and are still a majority in the diaspora, which consists of nearly 14 million people. The president of the country is traditionally a Maronite Christian, the prime minister a Sunni Muslim, and the speaker of parliament a Shia Muslim.