Showing posts with label Sunni Islam. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Sunni Islam. Show all posts
Tuesday, May 24, 2016
Saturday, January 02, 2016
Saudi Execution of Shia Cleric Sparks Outrage in Middle East
The Iranian government and religious leaders across the Middle East have condemned Saudi Arabia’s execution of a prominent Shia cleric and warned of repercussions that could bring down the country’s royal family.
In a serious escalation of religious and diplomatic tensions in the region, councils and clerics in Iran, Yemen and Lebanon said the killing of Sheikh Nimr al-Nimr would prompt widespread anger.
Iran’s foreign ministry spokesman, Hossein Jaber Ansari, accused Riyadh of hypocrisy. “The Saudi government supports terrorists and takfiri [radical Sunni] extremists, while executing and suppressing critics inside the country,” he told the Iranian state news agency. » | Nicola Slawson | Saturday, January 2, 2016
Middle East condemns Saudi execution of Shia cleric - live »
Friday, September 11, 2015
Netanyahu in Britain: Mideast Crumbling in Face of Radical Islam
The Middle East is disintegrating in the face of extreme Shi'a radicalism embodied by Iran, and extreme Sunni extremism incarnated by Islamic State, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said at the outset of a meeting Thursday in London with British Prime Minister David Cameron.
Netanyahu said that this – and how to “roll back the tide of militant Islam both in the Middle East and North Africa” – was one of three main issues he wanted to discuss with Cameron.
The second “no less important” issue, he said, was peace. (+ video) » | Herb Keinon | Thursday, September 10, 2015
Thursday, November 06, 2014
Sectarian Tensions Running High, Say Australian Muslim Leaders
"The tensions are very high and will continue to be high," said Jamal Daoud, a Shia community leader in Sydney, where a 47-year old Shia leader was shot in the shoulder early Monday morning, as worshipers observed the Shia ritual of Ashura.
He said Rasoul Al Mousawi, a leader in the Shia community focused around the Islamic center in Greenacre, south-west Sydney, had been released from hospital on Tuesday and was doing well.
The attack was only one incident in a string of attacks and threats against Shia Muslims by Sunni extremists who sympathized with ISIS, he claimed, and had followed an incident where a group of men had driven past the Islamic center, yelling comments such as "IS lives forever" and "Shia dogs" in Arabic.
A security guard had also been attacked by a group of men who appeared to be followers of the austere Wahhabi tradition of Sunni Islam on Friday, he said.
"There's high tension between Sunni and Shia, but these extremists, they threaten and attack Sunnis too," he said.
"Anyone who speaks against the fighting in Syria and advocating the government to take action against people in Iraq and Syria -- they are threatened and attacked."
Jamal Rifi, a Sydney-based GP and Sunni community leader, agreed, saying sectarian tensions were at an unprecedented level as a result of the brutal Syrian conflict, and the appeal of ISIS to radicalized Sunni youth in Australia. » | Tim Hume, CNN | Thursday, November 06, 2014
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Tuesday, November 04, 2014
Australia: Shooting Sparks Fear of Muslim Sectarian Violence
The attack, on a 47-year-old father of five at a Shia establishment, happened in front of his family on one of the holiest days of the Shia Muslim calendar.
The man, identified as Rasoul Al-Musawi, was standing outside the prayer hall in Greenacre, in Sydney’s southwest about 1.15am when he was struck in the face and shoulder with pellets. He was expected to undergo surgery. His injuries are not considered life-threatening. » | Anthony Klan | Journalist | Sydney | Tuesday, November 04, 2014
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Thursday, March 14, 2013
HINDUSTAN TIMES: Sunni Islam's highest seat of learning, Al-Azhar, said on Thursday that it wants "better relations" with the Vatican under Pope Francis.
"We are hoping for better relations with the Vatican after the election of the new pope," Mahmud Azab, adviser for inter-faith affairs to Al-Azhar imam Ahmed al-Tayyeb said.
"As soon as a new policy emerges, we will resume the dialogue with the Vatican which was suspended in early 2011," Azab said. "We congratulate the Church of St Peter and all Catholics around the world."
In 2006, Pope Benedict sparked fury across the Muslim world when he recounted an anecdote in which the Muslim Prophet Mohammed was described as a warmonger who spread evil teachings by the sword. » | AFP, Cairo | Thursday, March 14, 2013
Saturday, February 25, 2012
BIKYA MASR: CAIRO: Foreign and “unnamed hands” are targeting Islam, the Islamic world and Arabs in the recent events in the region, Saudi Arabia’s King Abdullah said.
The king, who was giving a televised address Friday night to a conference of prominent Saudis, did not name any country in particular.
But Saudi officials have used similar terms in recent weeks to suggest a connection with Iran, a Shia country at odds with Sunni Saudi Arabia.
“There were hands that are known to you all … behind what has happened in the Arab world, regrettably targeting Islam and the Arabs,” he said. » | Bikya Masr Staff | Saturday, February 25, 2012
Tuesday, November 02, 2010
THE DAILY TELEGRAPH: Saudi Arabia's top clerics have challenged the government's policy to expand jobs for women with a fatwa ruling that they should not work as cashiers in supermarkets, according to reports.
The Council of Senior Scholars, the official fatwa issuing body, said that "it is not permissible for a woman to work in a place where they mix with men," the news website Sabq.org said.
"It is necessary to keep away from places where men congregate. Women should look for decent work that does not make it possible for them to attract men or be attracted by men," it said. >>> | Monday, November 01, 2010
Tuesday, September 07, 2010
HUMAN EVENTS: The caliph in Sunni Islam is the symbol of the supranational unity of the Muslims, and is the successor of Muhammad as the military, political, and spiritual leader of the Islamic community. There hasn’t been a caliph for nearly 90 years, but now Pakistan’s Minister of State for Industries, Ayatullah Durrani, has a novel idea for just the right man for the job: Barack Obama!
The caliphate was abolished in 1924 by the secular Turkish government; foremost on the agenda of Islamic supremacists worldwide is its restoration. Hamstringing that effort, however, has been the lack of a candidate who would be acceptable to everyone concerned. The elusive one-eyed Islamic cleric who leads the Taliban in Afghanistan, Mullah Omar, was declared caliph—Emir al-Momineen, or Leader of the Believers—by his followers in 1994.
Omar went to the Shrine of the Respectable Cloak of Muhammad in Kandahar, climbed up onto its roof, and wrapped himself in the Muslim prophet’s cloak, to the jubilation of his followers below. But Omar's claim to the caliphate has been complicated by a number of matters since then—notably the toppling of the Taliban from state power by American forces—and his claim to the caliphate has been acknowledged by only one group outside Afghanistan: Al Qaeda in the Islamic Maghreb, a group formerly known as the Salafist Group for Preaching and Combat—a name that shares none of the U.S. government’s delicacy about identifying Islamic preaching as a not infrequent source of jihad violence.
The restoration of the caliphate is foremost on the agenda of the global mujahedin because, according to Islamic law, the caliph alone can declare offensive jihad against infidel nations—which is why Osama bin Laden and other jihad theorists cast all the present actions of Islamic jihadists as defensive.
Islamic supremacists also see the abolition of the caliphate as the loss of the unity of the umma, the Islamic community worldwide; they see a divided Islamic umma as a weakened one, subject to buffeting and humiliation from colonialist and neo-colonialist powers. >>> Robert Spencer | Tuesday, September 07, 2010
Related >>>
Sunday, June 06, 2010
REUTERS: Egypt's al-Azhar's satellite channel that seeks to promote moderate Islam launched four language services to extend its reach to millions of Muslims worldwide, its designers said on Sunday.
Al-Azhar, one of the oldest seats of Sunni Islamic learning, will target viewers in English, French, Urdu, and Pashto besides its now running Arabic programs, in a renewed effort to further U.S. President Barak Obama's call for greater religious tolerance.
The station was launched to coincide with Obama's visit to Cairo in mid-2009 and his call for better ties between the Muslim world and the United States.
Al-Azhar, whose head is appointed by the state, has traditionally supported the Egyptian government in its campaign against Islamic militants, such as a group that launched an insurgency in Egypt in the 1990s
.
"There is a wide open market for religious moderation on the airwaves," said Sheikh Khaled El Gendy, Azhar religious scholar and one of the channel's content developers.
"We are competing with voices of intolerance for the attention and loyalty of young people," Gendy, who hosts a live call-in program for viewers struggling with the interpretation of Islam to seek guidance, said. >>> Dina Zayed, Cairo | Sunday, June 06, 2010
Thursday, March 25, 2010
BBC: An Islamic state school in Britain has been told it is breaking the law by favouring Sunni pupils over Shia ones in giving out places.
England's schools adjudicator says the Madani High School in Leicester was set up in the state sector as a school for all Muslims.
But she says the school's admissions system favours four schools of Islamic law which belong to the Sunni sect.
The school transferred to the state system in 2007.
In her report on the school, schools adjudicator Dr Elizabeth Passmore wrote: "It seems to me to be clear that the school was expected to be a Muslim faith school, equally accessible to all Muslims and not one giving priority to a particular group of Muslims."
The expectation that the school would be accessible to all Muslims may have contributed to the strong support it received, she added.
"The documents I have seen all refer to a Muslim faith school and therefore priority for a place can be given to Muslims and not limited to members of a particular Muslim sect."
Sex discrimination
She also said the school's policy of admitting a fixed proportion of places to boys and girls might breach the Sex Discrimination Act, which prevents pupils from being disadvantaged because of their sex.
Dr Passmore said: "[The school] must allocate places without regard to the gender of the applicant as it is a mixed school." >>> | Thursday, March 25, 2010
Thursday, October 08, 2009
AFP: CAIRO — A Islamist lawmaker called on Wednesday for the head of the most prestigious centre of religious learning in the Sunni Muslim world to resign after he told a schoolgirl to remove the veil covering her face.
The demand to step down came as about two dozen students, wearing the face veil, known as a niqab, protested outside the state-run Cairo University, which has banned the veils from its residence hall.
Mohammed Tantawi, head of Al-Azhar University, told a schoolgirl to remove her niqab when he spotted her during a tour of an Al-Azhar affiliated school, the independent Al-Masry al-Youm newspaper reported this week.
He also said he intended to ban the niqab at Al-Azhar and made an unflattering remark about the girl's appearance when she took off the veil, the newspaper said.
"And you look like this; what would you do of you were a bit pretty," he reportedly asked, adding "I know more about religion than your parents."
Al-Azhar spokesman Ahmed Tawfiq confirmed Tantawi had asked the girl to remove the niqab, but said he spoke to her in a kindly way.
He said Tantawi, who insists the niqab is not an Islamic practice, wanted to ban the niqab from Al-Azhar classrooms on religious grounds.
"The imam always bases his decision on religious grounds," said Tawfiq.
Hamdi Hassan, an MP with the Muslim Brotherhood, Egypt's largest opposition group, said "Tantawi cannot stay in his post; he hurt's Al-Azhar every time he says something.
"I believe the niqab is not an obligation, but it is a benefit," he added. "Why ban it from Al-Azhar? It's a religious institution, not a belly dancing academy." >>> Samer al-Atrush (AFP) | Wednesday, October 07, 2009
ARAB TIMES: KUWAIT CITY: A Kuwaiti hardline Salafist MP on Wednesday blasted Egypt’s leading cleric Mohammed Tantawi for reportedly saying that wearing a face veil was not an obligation under Islam for women. “Tantawi’s statements against the niqab (face veil) are shameful,” Mohammad Hayef told reporters. “He is known for his bizarre and abnormal fatwas (religious edicts).” Tantawi, head of the Islamic Al-Azhar University, reportedly asked a student to take off her niqab when he spotted her in a classroom at an institute run by the university. The cleric reportedly said the niqab was a tradition, not an Islamic obligation.
The niqab has come to be associated with Salafism, a brand of ultra-conservative Islam practised mostly in Saudi Arabia and some Gulf states. Al-Mutairi, who is also the Al-Thawabet Bloc Secretary General — asserted this statement defies the actions of Islamic clerics and the spirituality code of scholars. Islamists in Egypt and the whole world launched a scathing attack against Al-Tantawi immediately after the publication of these reports. “The public has grown familiar to the appalling statements of Al-Tantawi who has continued to brandish his idiosyncrasies to the whole world,” said Al-Mutairi. [Source: Arab Times] Dahlia Kholaif, Arab Times Staff and Agencies | Wednesday, October 07, 2009
Thursday, September 03, 2009
YNET NEWS: Prosecutors accusing Shiite cleric, 12 others group of receiving funds from Iran to promote 'extremist ideas to sow unrest in Egypt'
An Egyptian official says a Shiite cleric and 12 others have been accused of receiving funds from Iran to promoting "extremist" Shiite doctrine in Sunni-dominated Egypt.
Shiites form a small minority in Egypt, where Sunni Islam is the official state religion.
The official said Thursday that prosecutors are accusing the group of insulting Sunni Islam and promoting extremist ideas to sow unrest in Egypt. >>> Associated Press | Thursday, September 03, 2009
Tuesday, July 21, 2009
Tuesday, March 24, 2009
BBC: Underlying tensions between Sunni and Shia in the Middle East have escalated to full-scale crises in the past few years in countries such as Iraq, Lebanon, Bahrain, and, most recently, in Saudi Arabia.
Although they only represent 15% of the overall Saudi population of more than 25 million, Shia are the dominant population, according to the International Crisis Group, in key towns such as Qatif, Dammam, and al-Hasa, which are home to the largest oil fields and processing and refining facilities.
In February, clashes between Shia Muslims and the religious police in Madina, Islam's second holiest city, triggered a wave of unrest, resulting in the arrest of dozens of people.
Tensions were eased by King Abdullah's decision to release all the detainees but the situation remains volatile.
Many Shias in Saudi Arabia relate far more to fellow Shia in Iraq, Iran, Lebanon and Bahrain, than with fellow Saudis who follow the puritan Wahhabi school of Islam. Wahabbis often class the Shia as heretics, or even to have left the faith entirely.
And at a time when many Arab officials point to the predominantly Shia Iran as the most serious security threat they face, there is a general attitude in the Arabic media that suggests Saudi Shia are somehow led by or follow an Iranian agenda.
But Saudi Shias deny this and say they face unfair discrimination.
Accusations of discrimination are backed by many western governments, led by the United States, which repeatedly express their concerns about religious freedom in Saudi Arabia. >>> By Anees al-Qudaihi, BBC Arabic Service | Tuesday, March 24, 2009
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