 Al-Azhar, Islam's highest Sunni authority, will launch a satellite TV channel to counter "anti-Islam onslaughts and highlight the true essence of Islam," once opposition over its funding has been resolved, officials at Al-Azhar said.
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The project was recently approved by the Islamic Research Academy (IRA), the highest authority at Al-Azhar, at the request of academy committee member Abdel Rahman Al-Adawi. Adawi's plan, which was proposed almost one year ago, is to establish a satellite channel to promote and correct the image of Islam and to fight the radical Islamic thoughts often broadcast on Arabic satellite channels.
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Adawi said it had become a religious duty to launch the channel in light of recent media attacks on Islam, the Qur'an, and Prophet Muhammad's sayings and Hadiths (teachings).
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"The academy's follow-up committee was alerted to this danger and realized that we should stop any attempt to demean the image of Islam and Prophet Muhammad (peace be upon him)," Adawi told Arab News. "Part of our campaign is to counter a colonial war against Muslims and their faith." The scholar said the satellite channel would not attack other people or groups, nor attempt to cast doubt on other religions. "We will carry out what Islam preaches, which is to embrace other religions," Adawi said. Officials at the IRA said the project should have been approved a year ago, but financing was its major problem. The IRA's secretary-general, Sheikh Ibrahim Al-Fayoumi, told Arab News that Al-Azhar was still unable to fund this multimillion Egyptian pound project. "We asked the government and officials at the state-owned TV to help us, but they were not convinced of the seriousness and importance of the project," said Fayoumi. Indeed, early this year, the Information Ministry turned down a request by the religious committee of the radio and television union to set up a religious satellite channel or to allocate airtime on Egyptian satellite channels to defend Islam. |