Religion in the Middle East

According to Brecher (213), every member of each religion believed and valued his or her own religion with very little concern for other people's religion. As a result, each religion obeys and values their religion and regards it as more superior and important than other religions in the Middle East region. Disrespect for other religions by a member of a particular religion creates constant conflicts among different regions. Over time, this conflict has grown to higher levels and to the international levels of scale. Furthermore, conflict in the Middle East is unique because it constitutes every aspect of daily life among people of the Middle East. In addition, the perspective of Zarka is hardly shared by most of Sunni Muslims including believers outside the extremist's groups like ISIS.

For instance, the uprising among Arabs in the year 2011 created more questions in trying to understand features of a true believer. In addition, real Muslims struggle to give a full interpretation of what constitutes real faith of their religion. This is particularly meant to reduce or spot other believers from different faiths who use dressing codes and ways of communication of other religions to carry out harmful practices to destroy the well-being of their counterpart religions. Similarly, the uprising of Arabs in 2011 was to form controversial and arguable assertions in relation to the collapse of the state. In some cases, a collective goal of creating more forms of pluralistic government further grew into a more worse-seeded sectarian conflict like the uprising in Bahrain is usually overshadowed by the large-scale violence in Iraq and Syria.

Due to increased misuse of religious powers in gaining popularity, Sunni Muslims are making efforts to democratize religion in the Middle East. This means that no specific religious leader or authority can interpret and declare the supremacy of any Islamic interpretation. For instance, every Islamic group has equal power of say in the Middle East. This democracy among Muslims has been happening from the start of the 1970s when political movement of Islam gained traction in the society of Arabs until it gained momentum significantly in the 1990s. Later on, Abu Bakr was made the first Caliph following the death of Mohammed and Aisha, his daughter later became among the wives of the prophet (Fox 27). This resulted in an eventual separation of Islamic religion where the Shia strongly believed that the rightful successor of the prophet must have come from his bloodline.

Secondly, the physical figure of Aisha herself created suspicion from the Sunnis and believed she used to commit adultery when she was already married to the prophet. In addition, the Quran illustrates that Aisha never possessed extra-marital affairs. On the other hand, the Sunnis believed in the Quran and anyone who doubted it to this level or any other point of doubt is an apostate. In other words, the Middle East has become a home to most violent and chaotic zones of war in the world. The highly affected countries include Sudan, Saudi Arabia, Egypt, Libya, Algeria, Syria, Yemen, and Iraq. According to Ellis (18), conflicts in these countries usually have many causes but religion and religious hostilities form the core factors motivating conflicts in most of these countries.

For instance, it also put into account the activities of the ISIS, a group of Islamic military that established a caliphate in many parts of Syria and Iraq. Religious hostilities in the Middle East comprise of the following facts: In 2014, about 800, 000 more people were displaced in conflicts relating to religious differences in the Middle East compared to previous year. According to Amnesty International, Islamic state militants organized for a campaign in a systematic manner that targeted ethnic and religious minorities (Hegland 179). Furthermore, instances of groups that meant to exterminate religious minorities and Shia Muslims were reported by the state department. Such groups targeted Shia communities and mosques. The Middle East region reported a large number of countries that experience terrorism relating to religious differences and conflicts in 2014 but Asia-Pacific region had the largest number of countries that experienced the same terrorism.

For instance, Israel was the most affected in 2014 to extend that it resulted in the death of over 50 causalities. This will cut down the cost of research than researching in every country in the country. Secondary sources of data i) Amnesty International Report This report provides a detailed illustration and data on the number of people affected, the specific countries affected and their specific times of the year. In addition, it also provides a breakdown of common forms of torture such as harassment, kidnapping, displacement, intimation and killing details. ii) Pew Research Center This site gives an illustration of public and religious life in the different countries of the Middle East. In addition, it indicates the Trends in global restrictions relating to the religion.