Al Bawaba: Iraqi parties blasted al Azhar - Islam’s most revered authority - at the backdrop of its Fatwa (religious ruling) banning Arab and Islamic countries from dealing with the Iraqi Governing Council, calling the US- backed body illegitimate. The Iraqi parties have also rejected the decree from the Arab-world’s highest-ranking Sunni Muslim institution, describing it as a “shame”. They suggested that it would be more useful for al Azhar not to indulge in political issues that concerned Iraqis.

On August 19, al Azhar issued a Fatwa banning Arab and Islamic countries from dealing with Iraq’s interim Governing Council, saying it lacks religious and political legitimacy. It described the council as been imposed on the Iraqis by the will of the occupation, and does not conform to Islam’s established principle of Shura (counsel).

But Mohammed Sayed Tantawi, the grand sheikh of al-Azhar mosque and university, said on Wednesday the committee that issued that fatwa had no right to make such judgements and would be brought to account. Tantawi told Reuters the clerics would be called to task for issuing the unauthorised ruling.