In an important international conference held recently in Cairo under the auspices of Al-Azhar and the Muslim Council of Elders, Grand Imam Dr. Ahmed Al-Tayeb the Sheihk of Al-Azhar and head of the Muslim Council of Elders warned against the phenomenon of “Islamophobia”, a phenomenon that is already rife in the West, fueling the clash of civilizations and religions and cultures, and reignites the prejudices that prevailed in the world, the horrors of which the European continent suffered from during the era of the Middle Ages.
The Sheikh Al-Azhar has spoken very frankly to the “freedom and citizenship conference … diversity and integration” and went on to new areas of inter-religious dialogue, and he discussed deeply the relationship between all religions, and terrorism, dismantled the frequent accusations on this matter from his point of view as a dignified scholar in front of the delegates of nearly 50 countries.
The Sheikh of Al-Azhar analyzed what is being said about the relationship between Islam and terrorism, pointing out that the real crisis in extremism lies in the understanding of the reality of religion and the significance of all religions and divine messages. He expressed hids deep concern at the growing phenomenon of Islamophobia in the West, and its increasing impact on Muslims in all countries of the world, which represents a free gift to terrorist organizations. The victims of this “phobia” are those who will later join terrorist organizations and revive them again if these organizations died or were wiped out in some areas!!
The Sheikh of Al-Azhar also made it clear that Islam has nothing to do with terrorism and said that the rejection of this relationship is not sufficient, and that the solution is to build channels of dialogue and cooperation between representatives of all religions.
The sheikh of Al-Azhar accused what he called “war brokers and arms dealers and theorists of the philosophies of neo-colonialism” of the blowing of the phenomenon of terrorism and in the name of the Islamic religion, describing what is happening around us as “disastrous pictures” that get more and more wider and darker.
His Eminence was also clear when he described terrorist groups as groups that went astray from religion. He warned strongly against their danger in the present time when he said, “Theses groups that went astray from religion were until recently limited in terms of impact and danger, and because of the insufficiency of weapons and weak gear, were incapable of distorting the image of Muslims, but now, they are about mobilizing the whole world against this true religion. “
The world is already living an extremely dangerous absurd spectacle and many people are talking about the alleged danger of Islam and Muslims without a real awareness of the consequences and the effects of what they are talking about. Hatred and the spreading of the culture of exclusion and rejection of the other are very dangerous to those very communities before being a threat to Islam and Muslims.
Islam has become an essential component of the West demography with varying ratios, so the fight against Muslims and the distortion of their image in this way that is not commensurate with the level of civilization and ascent and the deep values of coexistence reached by humanity, is essentially a manipulation of the foundations of the construction of these countries and communities, and an unjustified call for a miserable past that witnessed destructive religious conflicts that have remained for centuries, and which were over only after the blood of millions of people was shed.
He who thinks that blowing into the fire of hostility to Islam is far from the truth and did not read history, or did not understand its lessons. It is impossible to convince a mature mind to generalize crimes committed by a few thousand terrorists from Daesh and Al Qaeda (according to the best statistical estimates of the numbers of these criminals) on more than one billion Muslims. Muslims are not, as some right-wing politicians alleged, silent about terrorism, and he who says so does not understand the essence of Muslim communities, where coexistence has been witnessed by everyone for centuries without any problems!!
If the problem was in Islam, its followers would have been in conflicts with other religions since the beginning of the revelation and until now. But this did not happen historically. Terrorism has only appeared in recent decades, and particularly since the beginning of the Soviet invasion of Afghanistan and the emergence of what is known as the phenomenon of “jihadists”, whose story is known to everyone, and there is no need to tell it now. Everyone knows the fundamental role played by the West in funding this phenomenon, financing it and providing it with arms during the height of the cold war!! Then what happened is that Arab and Islamic countries and peoples paid an expensive bill for each of these plans and plots.
Any sane person is aware of who is behind terrorism now. The leaders of Al-Qaeda and their families have lived safely in Iran and Afghanistan during the reign of Taliban and did not live in Riyadh or Cairo or Damascus or Baghdad. Al-Baghdadi, leader of Daesh threatened to invade Saudi Arabia and Kuwait borders and did not threaten to invade Iran nor enter the city of Qom! It is ironic that a country like Iran claims to fight terrorism while it was not exposed to a terrorist crime whether inside or against its interests abroad, and the alleged map of Daesh spread to include sovereign Arab countries and did not affect or touch the borders of Iran !!
There are suspicious alliances that feed the terrorist phenomenon and use it as a cover to carry out plots and plans for expansion in the region, and the world should wake up from its slumber before more victims pay the costs of these senseless trends.
