Arab West Report Egyptian press summaries and media research for dialogue

A leading Salafist said that the West knows well that dignity and progress of the nation lies in the implementation of the sharī’ah, for the sake of which lives can be sacrificed. [Ghādah 'Abd al-Hāfiz, Al-Misrī al-Yawm, p. 3, Dec. 31] Read original text in Arabic

In an advertisement published in al-Ahrām newspaper, al-Shar'īyah society, an Islamist organization, said it is incumbent on all citizens to go to the ballot boxes and cast their votes for whoever single candidates or lists they think are worthy.

 The Board of State Commissioners on Monday withdrew a cultural award from the Egyptian researcher Dr. Sayyid al-Qimnī after he was convicted of having contempt for religion, judicial sources said.
In June 2009, al-Qimnī was awarded by the Egyptian Ministry of Culture for his achievements in social sciences.

The author discusses the dominance of Islam in the school curriculum in Egypt, considering this a “cultural purification” against people of other religions that contradicts international human rights resolutions. He has prepared a study of the Arabic language curriculum in elementary and preparatory schools and supports his argument with abstracts and examples from the book.

The author highlights incidents in Egypt in the last month that deal with religions and relations between Muslims and Christians, he believes that these incidents are representative of Egyptian attitude in general toward religions. He concludes by wondering if Egypt is going backwards.

The author discusses salafism and refers to its origin and definition throughout the Islamic history.

The article chronicles the appearance of famous dā‘iyahs in Egypt and covers the on-going struggle between the new dā‘iyahs and Salafis to take over the status of the publicly-adored dā‘iyah. The absence of an effective role of the Azhar is also questioned.

Rose al-Yūsuf reports about different opinions regarding the recent decision to ban books written by Jamāl al-Bannā.

Watani interviewed a Christian woman who received an MA in education from Ayn Shams university and is now a teaching fellow in the Arabic department at the university.

The article focuses on the various interpretations of secularism and discusses the advantages of the ideology.