Perhaps the extremists who call themselves Salafis in Egypt number around one to one and a half million, while their opponents the Sufis claim that they represent 15 million Egyptians. However, the extremists remain a force to be reckoned with, as they have mastered the use or exploitation of the local media. Every day, they seem to have an issue that they know will receive overwhelming coverage in the press and television networks. They cut off a Copt's ear on mere suspicion, and there was no proof that he had an illicit relationship with a Muslim woman who rented an apartment from him. Dr. Ali Gomaa, the Mufti of Egypt, said that enforcing the [Islamic] Hadd [Punishment] on a Christian is a crime by all standards, and that the Islamic Sharia is innocent of such actions. Meanwhile, Dr. Ahmed al-Tayeb, the Sheikh of Al-Azhar, offered to treat the Christian citizen at his personal expense, and received him in his office. Is it logical to enforce the Hadd in Egypt in the twenty-first century? If the Egyptian government did that, and relative to the sheer number of crimes where it would be applicable, the Hadd would result in thousands of disabled people who would become an additional burden to social and health services in a country with limited resources. However, the extremists refuse any ideology other than theirs, to the point that they accuse those who differ with them of blasphemy. After he got out of prison, Abboud al-Zumar proposed the formation of a blasphemy committee. However, Muslim scholars responded to him by saying that this runs contrary to what a definitive text in the Quran and the Sunnah of the Prophet has stipulated. Also, the preacher Wagdy Ghoneim caused frenzy in the media when he attacked the Ministry of Endowments at a mosque in the Jurists Village in Tookh in the province of Qaliubiya, “for its rapprochement with the Copts”. He called on the audience to refrain from shaking hands with Christians or greeting them, and to only greet them back if Christians initiated the greeting. He also said that Christians must be prohibited from walking in front of Muslims (this is one step further than what the Ottomans did a hundred years ago, who, upon seeing a Jew walking on the pavement with them, would tell him to ‘go left', and head to the pavement on the other side to keep away). Wagdy Ghoneim also called for crosses to be removed from churches and for Christian prayers and rituals not to be broadcasted, such as the tolling of the bells (it seems that this extremist preacher is going even further than Umar, who gave the Christians in Jerusalem rights that are akin to the best of modern laws, as part of his well-known Umari Covenant). Sheikh Mohamed Ashour, a member of the Islamic Research Council, responded to Wagdy Ghoneim and said that Christians have civil rights that make them equal to the Muslims, and that Islam does not persecute other faiths. Perhaps the extremists would not have caused this much frenzy in the media, had they remained in their caves like bats. Their religious views are known to all, and were never a secret. However, they were never going to be in power, and had steered clear of politics, which some of these people distort. This continued until the Youth Revolution triumphed, after which they acted as though they were the ones behind it, even when their statements in the beginning were opposed to the revolution from the standpoint that says that strife is worse than murder. In my opinion, these people will not rule Egypt any time soon or otherwise. However, they may become primary partners in a post-election government. They and the Muslim Brotherhood had worked together in the last referendum which approved provisional constitutional amendments until the elections are conducted, after which a new constitution is going to be drafted. I thus do not rule out a marriage of convenience between the two sides in the legislative elections, and after that in the presidential elections. Even if the representation of the Muslim Brotherhood and the extremists combined among the Egyptian electorate does not exceed 20 to 25 percent, they are still capable of pushing all their supporters to vote, as we have seen in the ‘Battle of the Ballots'. This is while the other parties which represent the majority of the Egyptians may not be able to persuade more than 20 percent of their partisans to vote, with the result being that both sides appear equally popular. Nevertheless, it must be said that the Muslim Brotherhood are sane and moderate, and what we have read about the program of their party, the Freedom and Justice Party, with the announcement of its creation, is rather reassuring. The Sheikh of Al-Azhar, the Mufti of Egypt, and the Minister of Endowments, along with senior scholars, including Sheikh Yusuf al-Qaradawi, have all stood up to the extremists and reasserted the moderation of Islam. It remains for the youths of the revolution to defend the latter. They have been calling for a civil democratic state for all citizens, and now they find themselves facing a faction that is calling for a certain type of religious rule which is rejected by all mainstream religious authorities in the country. Next September, we shall know whether the youths of Egypt will succeed in protecting their revolution, or will see the advocates of the counter-revolution hijack it. In the meantime, I look at the advocates of extremism and say that Egypt, in spite of them, will remain a torch of wisdom and an oasis of security and safety for its people and for us all. [email protected]
