Algeria, Turkey, Brunei and Uzbekistan are some of the many countries that include an Islamic star and crescent on their national flag.Īlthough Singapore has a crescent and stars on its flag, they do not have religious significance.
In Bahrain, the national flag features five white triangles, symbolizing the Five Pillars of Islam. Islamic symbols are found on the flags of 21 countries in sub-Saharan Africa, the Asia-Pacific region and the Middle East and North Africa. Spain, Greece, Norway and the Dominican Republic are among the other countries with Christian national symbols. Some Commonwealth countries continue to incorporate the Union Jack as a part of their own flags, including Fiji, Tuvalu, Australia and New Zealand. The United Kingdom’s “Union Jack,” for example, includes the crosses of St. Of the 64 countries in this category, about half have Christian symbols (48%) and about a third include Islamic religious symbols (33%), with imagery on flags from the world’s two largest religious groups appearing across several regions.Ĭhristian symbols are found on 31 national flags from Europe, Asia and the Pacific and the Americas. A third of the world’s 196 countries currently have national flags that include religious symbols, according to a new Pew Research analysis.