Azhar Imam Under Fire over Niqab

CAIRO -- Sheikh Mohamed Sayyed Tantawi, the Grand Imam of Al-Azhar, is under fire over ordering a school girl to remove her niqab and vowing to ban the face-veil in schools affiliated to the highest seat of religious learning in the Sunni world. "Tantawi cannot stay in his post; he hurt's Al-Azhar every time he says something,” Hamdi Hassan, an MP with the Muslim Brotherhood, Egypt's largest opposition group, told Agence France-Presse (AFP) on Wednesday, October 7.

During a visit to a school earlier this week, Sheikh Tantawi ordered a school girl to remove her niqab, telling her the face-veil is “a tradition and has nothing to do with Islam.”

Tantawi, the Muslim-majority country’s top religious authority, vowed to ban the niqab all schools linked to Al-Azhar.

Established in 359 AH (971 CE), Al-Azhar mosque drew scholars from across the Muslim world.

Over the years it grew into a university, predating similar developments at Oxford University in London by more than a century.

The Grand Imam of Al-Azhar is appointed by the president of Egypt and is treated, in terms of protocol and salary, on equal footing with the prime minister.

Why Ban?

Tantawi’s critics are not necessarily contesting his view on niqab, but rather his decision to ban it.

"I believe the niqab is not an obligation, but it is a benefit," said MP Hassan.

But MP Hassan still does not understand why Tantawi wants to ban it.

"Why ban it from Al-Azhar? It's a religious institution, not a belly dancing academy."

Sheikh Ali Abu al-Hasan, the former head of the Fatwa Council at the Islamic Studies Institute (ISI) in Cairo, agrees.

He contends that although it was not required by Islam for women to cover their faces, Al-Azhar University should allow women to choose what they want to wear.

"No official has the right to order a young lady to remove a form of dress that was sanctioned by none other than Umar ibn al-Khattab, except for the purposes of identification for security reasons," Abu al-Hasan told Al-Jazeera

"The niqab is not in contravention of Shari’ah or Egyptian law."

A researcher prevented from using the library at the American University in Cairo in 2001 because of her niqab took her case to the Supreme Court and eventually won.

The court ruled a total ban on the niqab to be unconstitutional.

Husam Bahgat, of the Egyptian Initiative for Personal Rights, accused the government of "arbitrary" measures against women who wear the niqab.

"They are barred from government subsidized housing and nutrition because they are considered extremists."

About two dozen students, wearing the face veil, protested outside the state-run Cairo University on Wednesday for being denied access to the dormitory because of their dress code.

"I have exams in two weeks. I haven't found a house and I can't study," one student who gave her name as Fatin told AFP.

"What happened to individual freedom? Cosmetics are freedom, but not the niqab?"

Source: IslamOnline

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Egypt students decry niqab restrictions

Students in government-run higher educational institutions are decrying restrictions on the wearing of face-veils in the Muslim-majority Arab country.

"I don't understand their point of view," Heba, a Cairo University student, told Agence France Presse (AFP) on Tuesday, October 6, after being denied access to the university’s girls hostel for wearing the niqab.

She insisted that the restrictions, which are not yet declared as an official ban, are justifiable.

"If it's for security, we can lift the niqab for security and show them our IDs."

Outside one the university's female residences, students said they had been stopped at the gates when they tried to enter wearing face veils.

Some have written an official complaint and planned to lodge it with the university authorities.

"From a security standpoint, the niqabs weren't a problem for us," a security guard who has been ordered to bar women from entering the residence wearing a niqab told AFP on condition of anonymity.

"They would show their faces when asked. I was surprised by the decision," he added.

"If you want reasons, ask the education ministry."

But an Education Ministry spokesman insisted there was no such ban.

“There is absolutely no ban against students wearing the niqab," Adli Reda told AFP.

He said the orders were to have the students show their faces when asked for identification.

* Concerns

But Hossam Bahgat, of the rights watchdog the Egyptian Initiative for Personal Rights, said he had received complaints from students banned from entering Cairo University residences because they were wearing the niqab.

Analysts believe that the government’s stance on niqab is not simply based on security concerns.

"There is a secular trend in government, and the niqab is against that," Diaa Rashwan, a leading expert on political Islam in the Ahram Centre for Political and Strategic Studies, a local think tank, told AFP.

Most Muslim women in Egypt wear the hijab, which is an obligatory code of dress in Islam, but an increase in women putting on the niqab has apparently alarmed the government.

The ministry of religious endowments has recently distributed booklets in mosques against the practice while the health ministry reportedly wants to ban doctors and nurses from wearing it.

"There are (also) government concerns about Salafism," Rashwan notes.

Salafis put the emphasis on spreading the puritan creed of emulating the practices and beliefs of early Muslims.

They are reportedly gaining more grounds in many Muslim countries, particularly Egypt, and have major theological differences with Al-Azhar, the highest seat of religious learning in the Sunni world.

"Al-Azhar has always had a cautious dislike towards other trends that challenge its legitimacy," Rashwan said.

Al-Azhar, like the majority of Muslim scholars, says a woman is not obliged to cover her face or hands while Salafis insist she must.

Sheikh Mohamed Sayyed Tantawi, Egypt’s top religious authority, earlier this week vowed to ban niqab in all schools affiliated to Al-Azhar.

Source: IslamOnline

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