Okaz: Al-Azhar Grand Imam regrets siding with injustice

The Grand Imam of Al-Azhar Dr. Mohamed Sayed Tantawi expressed regret over the current deplorable conditions in the Arab and Islamic worlds especially in Iraq.

In an interview with Saudi Okaz newspaper yesterday, he said helping the aggressor is a crime.

He further said that siding with the oppressor is the main cause of the humiliation of the Islamic world but not the only cause of the Islamic world's humility.

He lashed out at former Iraqi President Saddam Hussein and said his aggression on a sister state was unfair and those who sided with him sided with injustice.

He turned to the 9/11 incidents and said this terror act was not in defense of Islam. Those who carried these incidents out were criminals, he added.

The US has full right to be on the lookout for those who perpetrated these crimes in which women, children and men from all over the world including the Islamic countries were killed.

Islam is a religion of peace and it has exonerated itself from all claim of terror, he said.