The largest religious group in Syria are Sunni Muslims, who make up about 74% of the population, of whom Arabic-speaking Sunnis form the majority, followed by the Kurds, Turkmens/Turkomans, Circassians, and Palestinians.
According to CIA World Factbook, 87% of Syrians are Muslim, the majority being Sunni Muslims (74%). A further 13% are Shi'a Muslims, following the Alawite (11%), Ismaili (1%) or Twelver Imami (0.5%) sects.
Sunni Muslims reside throughout the country. There is a huge diversity among the members of the Sunni Arab community in Syria and they cannot be perceived as a unified group. Sunni Arabs vary according to their political affiliation, practice and identity, as well as regional and tribal loyalties.
Sunni Muslims constitute approximately 10% of the Iranian population. A majority of Lari people (Persians), a part of Kurds, virtually all Baluchis and Turkomans, and a minority of Arabs and Lurs are Sunnis, as are small communities of Persians in southern Iran and Khorasan.
The country with the single largest population of Muslims is Indonesia in Southeast Asia, which on its own hosts 13% of the world's Muslims.
According to the Turkish government, 99 percent of the population is Muslim, approximately 78 percent of which is Hanafi Sunni.
Approximately 11 percent of the population are citizens, of whom more than 85 percent are Sunni Muslims, according to media reports. The vast majority of the remainder are Shia Muslims, who are concentrated in the Emirates of Dubai and Sharjah.
Islam in Lebanon has a long and continuous history. According to an estimate by the CIA, it is followed by 63% of the country's total population. Sunnis make up 31.9%, Twelver Shia make up 31.2%, next to smaller percentages of other Shia branches, such as Alawites and Ismailis.
DUBAI, United Arab Emirates (AP) — Qatar is a Muslim nation, with laws, customs and practices rooted in Islam. The country is neither as liberal as Dubai in the United Arab Emirates nor as conservative as parts of Saudi Arabia. Most of its citizens are Sunni Muslim.
Most Egyptian Muslims are Sunni and follow the Maliki school of jurisprudence, though all legal schools are represented. Shi'a Muslims make up a small minority.
Syrian Sunnis are subject to heavy discrimination from the Alawite dominated government apparatus; since the regime associates them with the Syrian opposition.
Today, there is a Damascus-based Sunni religious establishment that bears the imprimatur of the Syrian state. The regime's fashioning of such a Sunni religious establishment entailed a purge of several Islamic institutions deemed insufficiently subservient.
In the early days of their existence, 90% of the FSA consisted of Sunni Muslims and a small minority were (Shia) Alawites, Druze, Christians, Kurds and Palestinians.
Religion in Yemen consists primarily of two principal Islamic religious groups: 65% of the Muslim population is Sunni Muslim and around 35% is Zaydi Shia, according to the UNHCR. Shias are primarily Zaydi and there are also significant minorities of Twelver and Isma'ili Shias.
Today, Shia Muslims make up the majority of the Iraqi population. Iraq is the location of the holy cities of Najaf and Karbala, pilgrimage sites for millions of Shia Muslims. Najaf is the site of Ali's tomb, and Karbala is the site of the tomb of Muhammad's grandson, third Shia imam Husayn ibn Ali.
According to the last census and the latest statistics, 96% of the population is Muslim in Jordan. The great majority of these are Sunni Muslims.
The state religion in Qatar is Islam. Most Qataris belong to the Sunni sect of Islam. Shiites comprise around 10% of Qatar's Muslim population. Religious policy is set by the Ministry of Islamic Affairs and Islamic instruction is compulsory for Muslims in all state-sponsored schools.
Majority of the Kuwaiti Muslims are Sunnis and the rest are Shia'a. Adherents of other religions are given the complete freedom to practice their own rituals provided that provided that no prejudice may occur against Islam.
Shias comprise a majority in Iran, Iraq, Azerbaijan, and Bahrain, and a plurality in Lebanon, while Sunnis make up the majority of more than forty countries from Morocco to Indonesia.
Saudi Arabia is the birthplace of Islam, and most of its natives are adherents of the majority Sunni branch.
More than nine-in-ten (94%) Lebanese Shia support the organization, while an overwhelming majority (84%) of Sunnis in that country express unfavorable views. Muslims cannot rate Hezbollah, but views are on balance positive among those who do offer an opinion of the group in Nigeria and Indonesia.
Today, the majority of the Egyptian population is Muslim, with a small minority of Jews and Christians.
More than 99 percent of the population is Sunni Muslim, and less than 0.1 percent of the population is Shia Muslim. Groups together constituting less than 1 percent of the population include Christians, Jews, and Baha'is.
Islam was transmitted to China during the Tang and Song dynasties (618–1279) via the overland and maritime Silk Roads. Arabian and Persian traders built tombs and mosques (combining traditional Arab and Chinese architectures), intermarried with local Chinese, and raised the first generation of Chinese-speaking Muslims.
More than 99 percent of the population is Muslim (2010 estimate), associating their beliefs with either the Shafi'i order of Sunni Islam or Zaydi Islam, a distinct form of Shia Islam.