Religion at its best is based on God's great love for us all. 
In our relationship with Him we find ourselves loving all that He loves.

At its worst it can be used a tool to boost our individual or national pride and thus be an added cause of conflict. (Please note that this danger [expanded upon below] is a danger for all religions.)
Religion so easily becomes a system for self-justification that actually turns us as individuals away from God, and is used by ethnic groups to bolster national pride and therefore ferment trouble. 
The Pharisees who rejected Jesus were the most religious of people.

The Bible teaches that God in His great self-giving love humbled Himself and came face to face with us bearing away our sins. Jesus Christ takes away the sin of the world by actually bearing in his body all human sin and wickedness. God Himself was in Christ reconciling us to Himself - not counting ours sins against us.

We cannot approach him by being more religious; we can only be accepted on the basis of the grace of God shown in His forgiveness for us. 
That, of course, will have religious consequences for us inspiring us to prayer, fellowship, witness and worship. 
But these are the consequences of our relation with God not the cause of it.

Religion at its best, then, is founded on a relationship of love with God - a love that then spreads out to our fellow creatures.

But if religion is turned on its head and is used as a means of self-justification it becomes an evil force. 
1. This is made worse if there is no confidence in the love of God. 
Lack of confidence in His love for us easily leads to desperate attempts to please God - a desperation that can lead to appalling fanaticism. 

2. It becomes worse still if it is believed that the kingdom of God on earth is primarily expressed through the political and military power structures of this world - for then the desperate struggle must use the political and violent methods of the world.

The motive behind religious fanaticism is the attempt to escape from hell and gain the rewards of paradise. But Jesus warns us that self-righteous religious fanaticism actually has the opposite result. It becomes a road to - not away from - hell. (Matthew 23:15)

So is there any hope?
Remember it was the religious leaders who violently put Jesus on the cross. 
But on the cross Jesus prayed for their forgiveness! 
That prayer goes out into the entire world in all ages.
The prayer was answered by the resurrection of Christ from the dead. 

The question for us all is whether or not we are willing to accept that forgiveness putting all our attempts at self-justification behind us and forsaking our misplaced faith in our national and ethnic pride.