Libya
POPULATION 5,368,585
MUSLIM 98 percent
CHRISTIAN 1 percent
OTHER 1 percent
Country Overview
Introduction
Known officially as the Great Socialist People's Libyan Arab Jamahiriya, Libya extends from the Mediterranean Sea well into the Sahara. The country, which is located at a strategic crossroads of Europe, Africa, and the Middle East, has experienced many invaders, with Arabs eventually having the greatest impact on the indigenous Berber people. Beginning in 642 C.E., Arab Muslims swept across North Africa and eventually occupied the area. The Fatimid dynasty, established in North Africa by 910 C.E., then extended its control eastward across Libya. A century later the Fatimids responded to growing Berber opposition by bringing in members of two bedouin tribes, the Beni Hilal and the Beni Sulaim, from Arabia to quell the revolt. Successive waves of Arab invaders stamped their character on the Libyan people, but it was the Beni Hilal and the Beni Sulaim that ensured the Arab and Muslim character of the country.
The Italian occupation, which began in 1911, took some 35,000 immigrants to Libya over the next three decades. Mostly Christian, the Italian population shrank to a few hundred after the revolutionary government seized power in 1969. Similarly, a Jewish population numbering about 35,000 in 1948 shrank to no more than 100 residents by 1973.
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