According to The Pew Forum on Religion and Public Life, the percentage of the globe's population that practices Islam is about 25%, which is to say 1 in 4 people on Earth are Muslim. Of course, like any group that size Islam is far from monolithic and there are many variations therein. The two largest and most well known sects are Sunni and Shia Islam. Sunni is considered the "Orthodox" and is the larger of the two. It's basis is that the jurisprudence of all Islamic law is based upon the primary Hadiths and the Qu'ran using juristic reasoning and consensus. The main split occurred after the death of Muhammad and the Sunni believed the succeeding Caliph should be elected, where as the Shia believed that the son of Muhammad, Ali, should be the Caliph. The Shia believe that only God has the right to choose who should safeguard Islam and as such those related to the divinely ordained prophet had a special spiritual authority over the community.
Hezbollah (literally Party of God) was founded in 1982 by Abbas al-Musawi and Subhi al-Tufayli in response to the 1982 Israeli invasion of Lebanon during the Lebanese Civil War. It has both a political arm and a paramilitary arm and has been in conflict with Israel since it's founding. It's goals as listed by it's 1985 manifesto are
"Israel's final departure from Lebanon as a prelude to its final obliteration," ending "any imperialist power in Lebanon," submission of the Phalangists (a right ring party supported by Maronite Christians) to "just rule" and bringing them to trial for their crimes, and giving the people the chance to choose "with full freedom the system of government they want." The Muslim Brotherhood was founded in Egypt in 1928 as a fascist part by Hassan al-Banna, an Islamic school teacher. It started as an Islamic social group opposed to British rule and which viewed the Qu'ran as the basis of law for ordering any free society. It officially opposes violence and operates today as political party that supports democracy guided by Islamic principles.
Although the age of religious wars has more or less passed and many nations have freedom of religion to some degree, religion is still the source of conflict in many areas. The Middle East and Africa are perhaps the hotbeds of these activities, as religion is still very important in these regions and there are cases of violence against non-Muslim religious minorities, particularly Christians, For instance, the Nigerian Muslim militia Boko Haram targets churches and has the stated aim of creating an Islamic state, This is also seen in largely secular states such as China and France, where religion is often marginalized legally and many people hold a bias against the religious.
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