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"The remarks reflect the
hatred in his heart. It is a statement full of enmity and
grudge," Bardakoglu said.
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WORLD CAPITALS — Pope Benedict XVI's criticism of
Islam and the Islamic concept of Jihad as unreasonable and against
God's nature has sparked furor in the Muslim world on Thursday,
September 14, amid calls for the pontiff to retract his remarks.
"These remarks are unacceptable and
demonstrate ignorance of the Muslim faith," Mohamed Kanaan, the
chief judge of the Supreme Shari`ah Courts in Lebanon, told the
Doha-based Al-Jazeera channel.
"The remarks only play into the hands of those
seeking to tarnish the image of Islam."
In what some Vatican watchers see as a watershed
speech to academics on Tuesday, September 12, Benedict had portrayed
Islam as a religion which endorses violence, where faith is
"spread by the sword".
Using the words, "Jihad" and "Holy
War" in lecture at the University of Regensburg, he quoted
criticism of Prophet Muhammad (peace and blessing be upon him) by a
14th Century Byzantine Christian emperor.
"Show me just what Muhammad brought that was
new, and there you will find things only evil and inhuman, such as his
command to spread by the sword the faith he preached," Benedict
quoted Manuel II.
In Morocco, the daily Aujourd'hui said the
pope's remarks have upset a million Muslims around the globe.
"The global outcry over the calamitous
cartoons (of Prophet Muhammad) has only just died down and now the
pontiff, in all his holiness, is launching an attack against
Islam," it said.
Last September, a series of lampooning cartoons of
Prophet Muhammad printed by a Danish daily and republished by European
newspapers sparked a global outcry.
The daily urged the pope, as political leader of
the Roman Catholic Church, to "quickly prove that his ambition is
not to spark a war of religions."
Hatred
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Mazyek said the Roman Catholic
Church, which had violent chapters, should not point a finger at
extremist activities in other religions.
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Chief judge Kanaan asked Pope Benedict to retract
his insulting remarks.
"He must apologize," he told the
Doha-based broadcaster.
The remarks have also drawn fire from Turkey's
highest religious authority, reported Agence France-Presse (AFP).
"The remarks reflect the hatred in his heart.
It is a statement full of enmity and grudge," Ali Bardakoglu, the
head of Turkey's religious affairs directorate, told the NTV news
channel.
"It is a prejudiced and biased approach,"
he added.
Bardakoglu said the pope was not welcome in Turkey
unless retracting his remarks.
"I do not think any good will come from the
visit to the Muslim world of a person who has such ideas about Islam's
prophet. He should first of all replace the grudge in his heart with
moral values and respect for the other."
Pope Benedict is expected in Turkey on November
28-30 on an invitation from the Turkish government and the Ecumenical
Orthodox Patriarchate in Istanbul.
In 2004, the pontiff caused a stir by opposing
Turkey's accession into the European Union.
He said Turkey should seek its future in an
association of Islamic nations, not with the EU, which has Christian
roots.
Bloody History
Ejaz Ahmed, a member of an Italian governmental
consultative committee on Islam, also criticized the Vatican pope,
reported Italy's ANSA news agency.
"In his speech the pope overlooks the fact
that Islam was the cradle of science and that Muslims were the first
to translate Greek philosophers before they became part of European
history," he said.
"The Muslim world is currently undergoing a
deep crisis and any attack from the West can aggravate this
crisis," he said.
Aiman Mazyek, the president of Germany's Central
Council of Muslims, said the history of the Roman Catholic Church had
violent chapters.
"After the bloodstained conversions in South
America, the crusades in the Muslim world, the coercion of the Church
by Hitler's regime, and even the coining of the phrase 'holy war' by
Pope Urban II, I do not think the Church should point a finger at
extremist activities in other religions," he told the Sueddeutsche
Zeitung newspaper.
Haken al-Mutairi, Secretary General of Kuwait's
Umma party asked Pope Benedict to immediately apologize "to the
Muslim world for his calumnies against the Prophet Muhammed and
Islam".
Mutairi hit out at the pope's "unaccustomed
and unprecedented" remarks, and linked the Catholic Church
leader's comments to "new Western wars currently under way in the
Muslim world in places such as Afghanistan, Iraq and Lebanon".
The pope's statements amounted to "the pursuit
of crusades", he told AFP.
"I call on all Arab and Islamic states to
recall their ambassadors from the Vatican and expel those from the
Vatican until the pope says he is sorry for the wrong done to the
Prophet and to Islam, which preaches peace, tolerance, justice and
equality."
Mutairi urged Christian and Muslim religious
leaders to "spread the values of tolerance and clemency preached
by the prophets Jesus and Muhammed".
