Indonesian

Indonesians in Bahrain are mostly women from Java, West Java and Lombok who work as live-in domestic helpers, with smaller numbers in hotels, spas and other services. Their numbers have shrunk since Indonesia stopped sending domestic workers to the Middle East in 2015, and many who still come arrive through irregular channels that leave them open to trafficking, unpaid wages and confinement, with the embassy in Manama sheltering women who flee. Living inside their employers' homes, they share the Muslim rhythm of prayer and Ramadan but have little time of their own, gathering when they can for Quran study circles, Eid and the 17 August Independence Day flag ceremony organised by the embassy.

About 22,000 Indonesians live in Egypt, nearly all of them students of Al-Azhar University, which has drawn students from the Indonesian archipelago for more than a century and now counts them as its largest group of foreign students. Known at home as Masisir, most are graduates of Indonesia's pesantren boarding schools who come for degrees in Islamic law, theology, Quran and Arabic, intending to return as teachers, preachers and religious scholars. They live in shared flats in Nasr City's tenth district and in the old lanes around the Al-Azhar Mosque, organised by home province in family associations that meet new arrivals and find them rooms, and in a national student union. Shafi'i Sunni Muslims, many from Nahdlatul Ulama or Muhammadiyah homes, they keep up Indonesian piety and customs, from tahlilan prayer gatherings to the 17 August Independence Day celebration at the embassy.

Kuwait's Indonesian community has shrunk to about 6,000 people since Indonesia stopped sending new housemaids to the Middle East in 2015; the number of Indonesian domestic workers fell from almost 9,000 to under 2,000 in a decade. Today nearly half are skilled workers: nurses employed by Kuwait's Ministry of Health, oil and gas technicians, and hotel and factory staff. Most are Sunni Muslims who share Kuwait's faith, with a small Christian minority, and the embassy's Independence Day celebration each August is the community's main gathering.

Indonesians in Qatar are a community of about 23,000, from domestic workers to engineers in the gas industry, hotel and airline staff, bankers and teachers. Most are Muslims from Java and other islands, and their community life is shaped by Indonesia's great Islamic movements: a branch of Nahdlatul Ulama and the Indonesian Moslem Society in Qatar organise Quran study, Ramadan festivals and Eid prayers that draw up to a thousand people. A separate association gathers the Indonesians who work at the gas complexes around Al Khor in the north. A small Indonesian Catholic community meets alongside the Filipinos and Indians at the Catholic church outside Doha.

About 110,000 Indonesians other than the Javanese live in Saudi Arabia, three in four of them women working as live-in maids, cooks and nannies in Saudi homes. They are Sundanese from West Java and Banten, Sasak and Sumbawans from Lombok and Sumbawa, Madurese and smaller numbers from Sumatra and Sulawesi. Many came before Indonesia stopped sending domestic workers to Middle Eastern households in 2015, and tens of thousands more each year have arrived since on visit and Umrah visas outside official channels, without the protection of a registered contract. Shafi'i Sunni Muslims, they gather when they can in pengajian Quran study circles and at the embassy in Riyadh and the consulate in Jeddah, above all for the 17 August Independence Day celebration. Indonesia agreed in 2025 to reopen regulated recruitment to the kingdom, though new placements were still held up in mid-2026.

About 80,000 Indonesians live in the Emirates, spread across all seven emirates. Many came as live-in maids and nannies from Java and the other islands, and since Indonesia stopped sending new domestic workers to Middle Eastern households in 2015 newer arrivals work mainly in hotels, spas, airlines, hospitals, schools and the oil and gas plants at Ruwais. Most are Shafi'i Sunni Muslims who keep Indonesian customs such as communal Quran recitation and visits of forgiveness after Eid. They gather at the embassy in Abu Dhabi for Ramadan iftars and Eid feasts of lontong sayur and opor ayam, after prayers at a mosque the Emiratis named after President Joko Widodo. A small Catholic and Protestant minority meets in the church compounds of Dubai and Abu Dhabi.

Indonesians in Yemen are almost all young religious students, some 4,900 of them, drawn to the small desert town of Tarim in the Wadi Hadramawt, a centre of Sufi learning that Indonesian Muslims revere. The tie is centuries old: Hadrami Arab scholars and traders carried Islam to the Indonesian islands, and their descendants, the habaib, are honoured religious teachers in Indonesia today. Since the 1990s Indonesian santri have filled the seminary of Dar al-Mustafa, the Rubat Tarim and the Sharia faculty of Al-Ahgaff University, where they made up 109 of 130 graduates in 2024, and they go home to found boarding schools of their own. They stayed through Yemen's war, crossing overland from Oman when flights stopped, and their government has repeatedly moved students out of danger zones, most recently from Mokha in September 2026.