It is the moment to distinguish

«The distinction between people who believe and those who manipulate religious language must not be lost». A meeting with the rector of the Islamic University Al-Azhar

by Gianni Valente

Some students at a lecture in Al-Ahazar University

«Those who commit acts such as the massacre of Beslan cannot call themselves Muslims. Similar actions cannot be attributed to Islam and must be condemned at the religious, political and cultural levels». Ahmad Al-Tayyib, Rector of Al-Azhar University, in Cairo (400,000 students from 92 countries, the most prestigious cultural institution of Sunnite Islam), took part in the round-table meeting in Milan on the subject “Disarming terror. A role for believers”. He wouldn’t call himself an extremist. When he was Mufti of Egypt he resigned the post to avoid giving his own consent to the numerous death warrants asked of him. And yet even he in the past has expressed comprehension for the suicide attempts carried out by Palestinians «against objectives of the occupier Israel». Meeting the press, he is particularly eager to challenge the equation between terrorism, fanaticism and Islamic faith established by the Western media: «I hope that there are no doubts about Islam as a religion. As someone from the Middle East it would please me if the Western press were objective, for example in evaluating the reasons and the consequences of the conflict between Palestinians and Israelis. Instead I notice a general line up, everything is judged in a unilateral way».
What do Muslim leaders do to repudiate terrorists who say they act in the name of Islam?
AHMAD AL-TAYYIB: Islam is the religion of peace. It is the only religion that lays down moral principles for the way to treat enemies. Also it forbids the victors in a war to kill children, women, old people, and all those who did not participate concretely in the fighting. It forbids giving an injured enemy the death blow. It is even forbidden to uproot the trees and sack the gardens of the enemy. If a religion forbids the uprooting of trees, imagine whether it would permit to go and terrorize and kill innocent people. We take these things so much for granted that we feel embarrassed when people come and ask us how on earth Islam justifies terror. At the same time, and I beg pardon for my frankness, it seems to me that confusion is being created between two different things. Terrorism that strikes innocent people is one thing, another is to attach the label terrorism to what is only a reaction of self-defense to protect yourself from something, as in the case of resistance when faced with occupying forces. I would always make that distinction clear. The French who carried out similar acts under the Nazi occupation were considered heroes, not terrorists.

Above, the procession of delegates at the conference “Religion and culture. The courage of a new humanism”, moving towards the Cathedral Square for the concluding ceremony, Milan, 7 September 2004. Here below, the concluding ceremony of the conference

Should that distinction also be kept in mind with regard to the Palestinian suicide-bombers?
AL-TAYYIB: The Palestinians are a people who have nothing. Poor people who are killed every day. Since the beginning of the intifada, the number of Palestinian children killed is three times higher than that of Israeli children, but the former are never spoken about. It pains me to see that all the countries, including the Arab ones, are just looking on. The Palestinians are like a man throwing stones at a warplane. In desperation they resort to extreme means to oppose occupation.
It is a fact that in the West, after 11 September and the attacks in Madrid, terrorism is synonymous with Islamic fundamentalism …
AL-TAYYIB: The question about what we think of terrorism is a futile question. We were the first to pay for fundamentalism, and at a high price. In Egypt they killed president Sadat. Then Mubarak was the first to sound the alarm, at a time when Western countries granted the right of exile to fundamentalists, who were thus enabled to bloody the Middle East with attacks prepared in the West. I live in Luxor. The mosque in Luxor is a few meters away from my house. Still today many of the inhabitants of the area are in psychiatric care for the trauma they suffered on the day of the attack.
How do you explain the fact that there are some people who instigate terrorist attacks by quoting verses from the Koran?
AL-TAYYIB: The Crusaders also went to kill Muslims in the name of God: Pope Urban spoke in the name of the Gospel when he preached the fight against the infidel. And one can say the same about Ireland where religion is manipulated in order to justify attacks. But we don’t say that Christianity is the religion of terrorism because of this. I want to say that it is very easy to exploit religion for other purposes. But the distinction between people who believe and those who manipulate religious language must not be lost. We hope that the same awareness will not be lacking among our brothers in the West.