CAIRO -

Al-Azhar Sheikh Ahmed Al-Tayeb said that terrorism is a political phenomenon, not a religious one, and some Western political regimes manufactured it and exported it to the world, and attached it to Judaism, Christianity and Islam to achieve very complex gains and agendas.

The Sheikh of Al-Azhar’s statements came yesterday, Wednesday, when he received a delegation from the Royal College of British Defense Studies, headed by the British Ministry of Defense Attaché, Major General Stephen Deakin, and representatives of eleven countries, to exchange visions and experiences in the field of combating terrorism and extremism.

counter extremism

During the meeting, Al-Tayeb pointed out, according to the statement published on the Al-Azhar page on the social networking site "Facebook", to the ancient history of the Al-Azhar Foundation, which has exceeded a thousand years, which is one of the oldest international universities that has taken upon itself to spread the message of peace and brotherhood among all over the world. The extent of its ancient history, in which Egyptian students fraternize with their peers from more than 100 countries.

The Grand Imam explained that Al-Azhar responded to contemporary reality with pioneering ideas, starting with including in its curricula topics that combat extremism and takfir, clarifying the concept of Dar al-Islam and Dar al-Harb, the relationship of Muslims with others, fanaticism and hatred, and other topics and issues that extremist groups exploit and misinterpret, and immunize their students at the age of It was an early stage with a scientific method through which it is easy to immunize them intellectually and enable them to refute the ideas of these groups.

Al-Tayeb also indicated that he was keen, after the attack on the Church of the Saints, to establish an Egyptian family home, and to develop an intellectual methodology to deal with societal problems that affect the relationship of Muslims and Christians. And the signing of the Global Human Fraternity Document with the Pope with the aim of spreading a culture of peace and brotherhood and addressing intolerance and hatred among followers of different faiths.

According to the statement, the members of the delegation expressed their happiness to meet the Sheikh of Al-Azhar, and to follow up on his efforts to spread a culture of peace, brotherhood and coexistence at the global level, stressing that the meetings of major religious leaders and their efforts to consolidate the values ​​of tolerance, dialogue and peaceful coexistence is a matter that embodies the truth of the heavenly religions, and represents a protection wall. Against any attempts to penetrate the minds of followers of religions in the East and West.

Sheikh Al-Azhar: Terrorism is a political phenomenon created by the West

And the proof is the incident of #Texas and the Texas terrorist who killed 23 children and left a young racist Christian pic.twitter.com/71O6xUGFQy

— Magdy Kamel (@magdymohamed_) May 25, 2022

Facing the cultural invasion

The Sheikh of Al-Azhar has a firm position in the face of attempts to impose Western culture on the countries of the East, as it represents a “cultural invasion” of Eastern societies, according to his repeated statements.

Al-Tayeb was keen, on more than one occasion, to criticize negative behavior and policies, whether some politicians attack Islam, or attempts by Western bodies and institutions to impose European solutions to the problems of the East, or attempts to pass behaviors rejected in Eastern societies such as homosexuality and abortion.

During his meetings with Western officials, El-Tayeb stressed that ready-made solutions coming from Western bodies and organizations to our problems - such as homosexuality, abortion and others - do not provide any actual solutions to the problems we suffer from, but rather contradict our culture, and seek to impose many unacceptable behaviors in our societies and entrench a new conflict. .

The Sheikh of Al-Azhar also stood in the face of what he called "critics of rapprochement and dialogue between religions" and promoters of a unified religion called "Abrahamic", and stressed that it is a call to confiscate freedom of belief, faith and choice, stressing that people's meeting on one religion or one divine message is impossible, and pointed out the difference Between respecting and recognizing the faith of the other, and that this does not mean dissolving the differences between faiths, religions, and religions.

Refugee Support

On the other hand, the Sheikh of Al-Azhar received, yesterday, Wednesday, the head of the International Organization for Migration (IOM) mission in Egypt, Laurent de Boc, at the headquarters of the Sheikhdom of Al-Azhar, to discuss ways to participate in the preparation of the International Forum on Migration and Religion, and joint cooperation to support refugees and migrants, and to promote the values ​​of tolerance, brotherhood and coexistence.

During the meeting, El-Tayeb stressed that Al-Azhar is keen to publicize the issues of refugees and migrants, and always calls on all concerned parties to work on solving all their problems and provide them with the necessary support to face the challenges and difficulties that life imposed on them, which intensified after the emergence of the Corona crisis and the outbreak of war.

For his part, Laurent de Boc expressed the International Organization for Migration’s appreciation for the efforts of Al-Azhar Al-Sharif in supporting refugees and migrants around the world and knocking on all doors to overcome the problems they face. Promoting the values ​​of human brotherhood, coexistence and world peace.