SENIOR clerics will meet at Sydney's Lakemba Mosque tonight to discuss the future of controversial Muslim leader Sheik Taj al-Dina al-Hilaly - following public outcry over his comments comparing women to meat.Lebanese Muslim Association spokesman Keysar Trad said the meeting would take place at the mosque in SydneyÂ’s west from 9pm (AEST). "It is open to clerics who want to go, and they will be mostly from NSW," Mr Trad said.
Sheik Hilaly has said he will stand down if he is proved to have been deliberately offensive in his sermon that suggested women provoked sexual attacks. The sheik was widely criticised last week for comparing scantily clad women to uncovered meat.
Prime Minister John Howard today said he did not have the power to sack the Muslim leader, and could only call on those with power to resolve the issue. "The responsibility to resolve this matter sensibly rests with the Islamic community," he said. "I don't appoint him, I can't dismiss him.
"And there is no point in people in my position calling for this and that, other than to call upon those who have the power to resolve this matter, to resolve this matter in a way that promotes the interests of harmony in our community and promotes the view Islamic Australians are fully integrated into Australian society."
He said the Islamic community must hear what the rest of the Australian community was saying on the issue and asked them to "discharge their obligations as members of the Australian community". "If this matter is not properly handled by the Islamic community I am concerned that their failure to do so will do lasting damage to the perceptions of that community within the Australian community," Mr Howard said. "His remarks were totally unacceptable - full stop."
Meanwhile, Mr Howard said the Labor government at the time made a "blatantly political decision" to keep Sheik Taj al-Din al-Hilaly in Australia in the late 1980s.
News Limited newspapers - parent company of News Interactive, publisher of NEWS.com.au - have said that Mr Keating and leading Labor figure Leo McLeay demanded in 1989 that then-immigration minister Robert Ray grant the sheik residency and were furious when he refused. It was the second time the party leaders had attempted to intervene on behalf of the sheik, according to Labor sources.
The sheik arrived in Australia in 1982 but did not gain residency until 1990. "But it's happened now and he has rights as an Australian citizen and those rights have to be respected," Mr Howard said.
Sheik Hilaly said he would not be attending the Multicultural Eid Festival and Fair to celebrate the end of the Islamic fasting month of Ramadan at Fairfield today. A spokesman for the sheik said he did not want his presence to take the focus off the festival itself.