Preachers: clinging to power has nothing to do with religion and is a crime against Islam

A number of preachers have made a statement and affirmed that desperately clinging to power, provoking sedition and propagating chaos, is not Islamic. They say that trying to justify bloodshed and calling for martyrs without any right to do so, and calling citizens, Muslims, and other people of the book to rise up, to target soldiers, and to destroy property is a heinous crime against Islam.

The statement was signed by Dr. ‘Ali Juma’, Dr. ‘Ablah al-Kahlāwī, al-Habīb ‘Alī al-Jafrī, Mustafá Husnī, Dr. Usāmah al-Saīd al-Azharī, and Mu’iz Mas’ūd, to try to stop young people from being deceived by advocates of murder and bloodshed (Ahmad Bihaīrī, al-Masry al-Yawm, Aug. 19). Read original text in Arabic.