News / Egypt

Egypt's al-Azhar slams Daesh sex slavery rules

Thursday, 31 December 2015 6:28 PM [ Last Update: Saturday, 02 January 2016 12:20 PM ]

Egyptian men attend the weekly Friday Prayers at al-Azhar Mosque in Cairo's Islamic quarter, on October 2, 2015. (AFP photo)

Egypt’s highest Islamic authority, al-Azhar, has strongly denounced the Takfiri Daesh terrorists’ newly-released rules for sex slavery, stressing that they have nothing to do with Islam.

"This organization is a criminal and terrorist organization, and one of the goals of terrorism is the spread of its ideologies and the spread of its propaganda that will attract people's attention," Mohamed Mehna, a member of al-Azhar's Grand Sheikh's Technical office, said on Wednesday.

"Researchers who study terrorist organizations know this very well; that the media division is considered one of the most important tools for a terrorist organization to achieve its goals through instilling fear in people," he added.

The remarks come as Daesh leaders have recently issued an extremely detailed ruling on when "owners" of women enslaved by the extremist group can have sex with them. They have also issued a series of rules about the treatment of captured females.

Mehna added that Daesh and other terrorist organizations resort to such tactics to draw attention to their extremist ideologies.

"This is not Islam. Because Islam, with its long history, and the spread of Islam around the world, from South to North and from East to West, and the true history that has witnessed its sublime values, needs no debate," he said.

Egyptian Grand Imam of al-Azhar, Sheikh Ahmed al-Tayeb, at the headquarters of al-Azhar in Cairo on October 11, 2015 . (AFP photo)

Back in November, the head of the al-Azhar center of Islamic learning, Sheikh Ahmed al-Tayeb, said it would be unjust to link atrocities committed by Daesh to Islam.

Separately, Shia clerics have, on numerous occasions, condemned Daesh ideologies as irrelevant to Islamic teachings.

In September 2014, over 120 Muslim scholars from around the world issued an open letter to Daesh ringleader Ibrahim al-Samarrai, also known as Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi, rejecting the group's religious arguments to justify many of its actions.

The Daesh terrorist group has been committing heinous crimes, including the sexual abuse of women and young girls, in areas under their control in Iraq and Syria.

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