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Leading Sunni Clerics Demand Global Ban on Insults to Islam
CNS News ^ | September 17, 2012 | Patrick Goodenough

Posted on 09/17/2012 3:29:12 PM PDT by 2ndDivisionVet

Six months after declaring that all churches in the Arabian peninsula should be destroyed, Saudi Arabia’s top cleric called at the weekend for a global ban on insults targeting all religious “prophets and messengers,” a category that, from a Muslim perspective, includes Jesus Christ.

Saturday’s demand by Saudi grand mufti Sheikh Abdul Aziz Al-Asheikh came on the same day that another of Sunni Islam’s most prominent figures, Egypt’s Al-Azhar University grand imam Ahmed el-Tayyeb, made a similar appeal.

Both men were reacting to an amateur video satirizing Mohammed, whose emergence on the Internet has been blamed for protests targeting American diplomatic missions across the Islamic world. According to wire services at least 12 deaths have been linked to the protests since Thursday, with deaths reported in Tunisia, Sudan, Pakistan, Yemen, Lebanon and Egypt.

The two clerics’ calls are a new salvo in an unremitting campaign by Islamic political and religious leaders, spearheaded by the Organization of Islamic Cooperation (OIC), to pressure non-Muslims to treat Islam with deference.

In a statement released by the official Saudi Press Agency (SPA), Asheikh “appealed to all countries and international organizations to criminalize acts ridiculing all prophets and messengers (peace be upon them).”

The kingdom’s Arab News pointed out that he was referring to such figures as “Abraham, Moses, Jesus and Mohammed.”

Islamic doctrine holds that Mohammed, a 7th century Arabian, was the last in a long line of prophets of Islam stretching back to Adam, and including Enoch, Noah, Abraham, Ishmael, Jacob, Joseph, Moses, David, Solomon, Jonah, John the Baptist – and Jesus.

Nonetheless Asheikh last March told a delegation of visiting Kuwaitis that all churches in the Arabian peninsula should be destroyed. He cited a hadith – a saying or tradition of Mohammed – in which he was quoted as declaring on his deathbed, “There are not to be two religions in the [Arabian] Peninsula.”

The Kuwaitis had sought the mufti’s guidance after an Islamist lawmaker in Kuwait said he planned to submit a draft law banning the building of non-Islamic places of worship, arguing that there were already too many churches in the small Gulf state, given the size of the Christian community.

Saudi Arabia does not permit the existence of churches or public expressions of non-Muslim religious worship.

Although Muslims revere Jesus, Islam teaches that he was not divine and was not crucified. The Qur’an states (9:30): “the Christians say: The Messiah is the son of Allah … may Allah destroy them.”

Saudi media coverage of Asheikh’s new statement mentioned the call to criminalize offending speech, but gave greater prominence to his appeal for Muslims in their response not to “shed the blood of innocent people, or vandalize properties or public institutions.”

“If Muslims surrender to anger, they will achieve the objectives of those who are behind producing this offensive film,” SPA quoted him as saying.

Egypt’s Tayyeb, meanwhile, directed his appeal to United Nations Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon, urging a U.N. resolution outlawing “insulting symbols and sanctities of Islam” and other religions, Egypt’s state information service reported.

He also demanded that those “fools and misguided” people who commit such acts be punished for committing “these heinous acts of abuse to the prophet.”

Tayyeb said it was the U.N.’s responsibility to “protect world peace from any threat or aggression.” He also urged Egyptians to respond with “wisdom and restraint.”

As grand imam of Cairo’s Al-Azhar University, Tayyeb is traditionally regarded as the top authority in Sunni Islam worldwide.

Al-Azhar was one of two institutions that hosted President Obama in June 2009 when he delivered a major address to the Muslim world. “For over a thousand years, Al-Azhar has stood as a beacon of Islamic learning,” the president said in the opening lines of the speech.

For more than a decade, the OIC, a bloc of 56 Muslim states, has promoted a campaign at the U.N. to outlaw what it calls “defamation” of Islam. The initiative periodically picks up steam after incidents viewed by Muslims as insulting to their faith, such as the Mohammed cartoon episode and the desecration of Qur’ans, whether accidental or intentional.

U.S. Ambassador to the U.N. Susan Rice did a round of television talk shows Sunday, reiterating the administration’s view that the Mohammed video lies behind the violent protests.

While stressing that “there is no excuse for violence,” Rice told Fox News Sunday “there is no question as we’ve seen in the past with things like [Salman Rushdie’s 1988 book] Satanic Verses and cartoons of the Prophet Mohammad there have been such things that have sparked outrage and anger, and this has been the proximate cause of what we’ve seen this


TOPICS: Culture/Society
KEYWORDS: egypt; embassies; islam; koran; muslims; obama; saudiarabia; susanrice; waronterror
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To: 2ndDivisionVet

How about as soon as they stop chopping off people’s heads and burning Christian and Catholic Churches we will stop the insults??

Makes sense, right?


21 posted on 09/17/2012 4:08:19 PM PDT by Salvation ("With God all things are possible." Matthew 19:26)
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To: goat granny

Right. Let’s altogether now: “FFFFFFFFFF UUUUUUUUU!”

Man I feel better


22 posted on 09/17/2012 4:09:29 PM PDT by shalom aleichem
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To: 2ndDivisionVet

It’s impossible not to make fun of these Turd world savages. Did he say anything about insulting or not killing Christians and Jews?

Pray for America


23 posted on 09/17/2012 4:12:49 PM PDT by bray (If you vote for a communist what does that make you?)
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To: Jimmy4Toes

We need a new restaurant chain...

24 posted on 09/17/2012 4:13:35 PM PDT by 2ndDivisionVet (You cannot invade the mainland United States. There would be a rifle behind every blade of grass.)
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To: 2ndDivisionVet

Looks like my old home in the PI


25 posted on 09/17/2012 4:16:30 PM PDT by Jimmy4Toes (this tagline space is available.)
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To: 2ndDivisionVet

Muslims don’t eat pigs because even Muslims won’t engage in cannibalism.


26 posted on 09/17/2012 4:19:22 PM PDT by Psycho_Bunny (Islam is not a religion. Period.)
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To: 2ndDivisionVet

i’ll insult those 12th century camel humpers every chance I get!!!


27 posted on 09/17/2012 4:22:29 PM PDT by dalereed
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To: AdmSmith; AnonymousConservative; Berosus; bigheadfred; Bockscar; ColdOne; Convert from ECUSA; ...

Thanks 2ndDivisionVet.
Six months after declaring that all churches in the Arabian peninsula should be destroyed, Saudi Arabia's top cleric called at the weekend for a global ban on insults targeting all religious "prophets and messengers," a category that, from a Muslim perspective, includes Jesus Christ. Saturday's demand by Saudi grand mufti Sheikh Abdul Aziz Al-Asheikh came on the same day that another of Sunni Islam's most prominent figures, Egypt's Al-Azhar University grand imam Ahmed el-Tayyeb, made a similar appeal.

28 posted on 09/17/2012 4:56:01 PM PDT by SunkenCiv (https://secure.freerepublic.com/donate/)
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To: Uncle Miltie

i second your thoughts.

i guess we will both be beheaded.

blessings, bobo


29 posted on 09/17/2012 5:18:20 PM PDT by bobo1
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To: knarf

nah, its fluke islam.

i think i got it right.

blessings, bobo


30 posted on 09/17/2012 5:19:50 PM PDT by bobo1
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To: Psycho_Bunny

shucks, i never thought of it that way.

thanks.

blessings, bobo


31 posted on 09/17/2012 5:21:06 PM PDT by bobo1
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To: 2ndDivisionVet

Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, ...


32 posted on 09/17/2012 5:21:40 PM PDT by EBH (0bama is guilty of willful neglect of duty.)
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To: ArrogantBustard

agree, up to the point when you said a servant of a demon.

they are absolutely the servants of Satan.

blessings, bobo


33 posted on 09/17/2012 5:22:58 PM PDT by bobo1
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To: marron

think i’ll go to their embassies here in the US and burn a koran. Then i will promise to come back the next day and piss on one.

one good turn deserves another.

blessings, bobo


34 posted on 09/17/2012 5:25:49 PM PDT by bobo1
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To: 2ndDivisionVet; All
"Leading Sunni Clerics Demand
Global Ban on Insults to Islam"


35 posted on 09/17/2012 5:27:45 PM PDT by musicman (Until I see the REAL Long Form Vault BC, he's just "PRES__ENT" Obama = Without "ID")
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To: 2ndDivisionVet

The Islamists can kiss my Mohammed


36 posted on 09/17/2012 5:45:28 PM PDT by TexasFreeper2009 (Obama lied .. the economy died.)
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To: 2ndDivisionVet

someone needs to market some toilet paper with a picture of Mohammed


37 posted on 09/17/2012 5:46:53 PM PDT by TexasFreeper2009 (Obama lied .. the economy died.)
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To: 2ndDivisionVet

Mohamed’s father and grandfather were donkeys that consorted with swine.

Screw them. I’m tired of hearing Christians, Jews, Hindi etc... maligned by them. How about a global ban on islam? (lower case because it doesn’t deserve the respect.)


38 posted on 09/17/2012 5:49:34 PM PDT by Outlaw76 (Citizens on the Bounce!)
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Mohammed eats bacon sandwiches...


39 posted on 09/17/2012 5:50:08 PM PDT by pricilla (one should always try to be smarter than the equipment one is operating - Amajato)
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To: pricilla

40 posted on 09/17/2012 5:54:55 PM PDT by pricilla (one should always try to be smarter than the equipment one is operating - Amajato)
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