Kedesh was an ancient Canaanite and later Israelite settlement in Upper Galilee, mentioned few times in the Hebrew Bible. Its remains are located in Tel Kedesh, 3 km northeast of the modern Kibbutz Malkiya in Israel on the Israeli-Lebanese border.

Lebanese Shia Muslims, communally and historically known as matāwila, are Lebanese people who are adherents of Shia Islam in Lebanon, which plays a major role alongside Lebanon's main Sunni, Maronite and Druze sects. The vast majority of Shia Muslims in Lebanon adhere to Twelver Shi'ism, making them the only major Twelver Shia community extant in the Levant.