Arab West Report Egyptian press summaries and media research for dialogue

Dr. Sayyid al-Qimnī writes about how Islamic preachers and scholars misinterpret Islam and the Qur’ān.

Drs. Hulsman and Dr. Burslem provide a detailed report on Muslim-Christian relations based on a review of Dr. Hugh Goddard’s book, commenting on a number of issues including Western perceptions, mis-interpretations, and examples of recent incidents involving Muslims and Christians.

The following article presents an overview of the Annual Anglican-Al Azhar Interfaith Meeting that implicitly dealt with dialogue and means of furthering it. Wisam al-Deweny provides her input on the subject, and recommends means of improving this dialogue in the future.

The author praises those who speak out against Islam, focusing on Wafa Sultan, and Arab woman in the U.S. in whose recent interview on al-Jazeera, she stated that the clash is not a clash of civilizations, but a clash between the culture of the West, and the backwardness and ignorance of the Muslims.

The author discusses the concept of Arab nationalism, how it started, developed and deteriorated. He shows the opinions of some intellectuals on citizenship in Egypt where Muslims and Christians live.

The First Egyptian-German forum was held in Germany with the participation of 45 academics, intellectuals and media and religious men. The forum discussed the issue of democracy and its relation to citizenship.

The article sheds light on the different Christian groups in the Arab world to see which group can play the role of a cultural bridge between Islam and the West. It concludes that the Protestant denomination is the group that can play such a role.

Reforming the religious discourse means neither changing any of the bases of Islam nor being biased towards the group to which the religious discourse is directed. Also it is not only confined to developing the ways of Da´awa. Reforming the religious discourse means reforming the Islamic thinking and Islam´s perception of international, social and political relationships and its perception of the contemporary issues of life.

Adler addresses the election victory of Hamās, and also the prevalence of Islamic movements across the Middle East. He notes that their prime goals are political, rather than religious, and that they have had a major impact on the status quo of Middle Eastern geopolitics.

The article is based on two interviews with Dr. Tareq Mitri, a Lebanese professor and the head of the Islamic-Christian dialogue section at the World Council of Churches [and member of the Board of Advisors of AWR] and Coptic researcher Samir Marcos, counselor of inter-civilizational dialogue program at the Faculty of Economy and Political Sciences [not mentioned which university]. The two interview revolves around the meaning of "citizenship."