Tuesday, October 25, 2005

The book burners of Al-Azhar are at it again, and again. Mufti Muhammad Sayyid Tantawi (who last year threw an ash tray at a journalist when she asked him a question he did not like, and who was appointed to his position only because he possessed the qualifications of servility and senility that Mubarak insists on) just ordered a ban against the book Wahhabi Islam: From Revival and Reform to Global Jihad by Natana J. Delong-Bas because he said that it is offensive to Islam and Wahhabiyyah. Not true, I say. In fact, not only is the book NOT offensive to Islam or Wahhabiyyah, but I view it as an apologetic book on the topic, and the author received funding for it from a member of the Saudi royal family, as she herself says in the acknowledgement.