ABSTRACT
Syria and Egypt represent two ends of the religious spectrum in the Middle East. Syria has been home to one of the region’s most religiously diverse populations. It has also been led for decades by the Alawites, a minority non-Muslim group historically denounced by Muslims as apostates. Such are the complexities of the situation that the Alawite political leadership under former Syrian president Hafez al-Assad declared its group to be Shia Muslims, a claim at least superficially accepted. In Egypt, by way of contrast, the vast majority of citizens are homogeneously Sunni Muslim. The Coptic Christian minority has suffered discrimination by the regime and persecution by radical Islamists trying to overthrow the regime. It has retained a distinctive identity but also accepted the status quo.
