one god, many wars: religious dimensions of armed conflict in the middle east and north africa

Efforts to counter religious conflicts must focus on religious and non-religious causes as well as security and development. External support for religious extremism from countries in North Africa and the Middle East poses a special problem. Weak states both enable the activities of religious extremists and make their ideology a tempting alternative for the population. Parallel ethnic- and religious-identity boundaries increase the risks of interreligious confrontation. The causes of these conflicts are not yet fully understood, though they appear to demonstrate a mixture of religious and secular roots. Countries with mixed religious populations are prone to interreligious conflicts, which has materialised in cases such as the Central African Republic, Nigeria, and Côte d’Ivoire.

The consequences have been extreme: the violence has claimed thousands of lives and produced millions of internally displaced persons (IDPs) and refugees, and it continues to undermine the political, economic, and social development of the affected countries.Īlthough Islamist insurgencies predominate in ideas-based religious conflicts, Christian rebel groups in Congo-Brazzaville, the Democratic Republic of the Congo, and Uganda have also been active since the turn of the millennium. All these conflicts either have already spilled over to neighbouring countries or are likely to do so.

Geographical hotspots of theological armed conflicts are the Sahel, Nigeria, and Somalia. Ideas-based “theological” conflicts have strongly increased recently. Either warring factions differ by religious identity, or they have incompatible ideas regarding the role of religion in the state. As of mid-2017, eight out of ten armed conflicts in the region are displaying a religious dimension. This move is a reaction to severe religious violence in many sub-Saharan countries. In June 2017, the European Union announced its support for Sahelian governments in fighting religious extremists.

One god, many wars: religious dimensions of armed conflict in the middle east and north africa