CARIO: The highest authority in Sunni Islam overruled Egypt s mufti on Wednesday by branding a group of Egyptian illegal immigrants who drowned in a bid to reach Europe as martyrs.
Al-Azhar Islamic research committee decreed the illegal immigrants who drowned as martyrs, in a press statement, despite an article by Sheikh Ali Gomaa rejecting this status.
Gomaa attended a three-hour Al-Azhar committee meeting and maintained his opposition to the dead being classified as martyrs, which according to the Muslim faith means they would have direct access to paradise.
The committee also offered its condolences to the families of the dead, adding however that young Egyptians who leave looking for work and a better life should follow legal routes.
Egyptian religious authorities, including Gomaa, have said in the past that those who die in accidents are martyrs and therefore go straight to paradise.
Gomaa sparked outrage after he wrote an article saying the young victims threw themselves to their deaths; the aim of their trip was not to serve God and greed and the pursuit of money was their motivation.
I did not ignore the humanitarian dimension of the problem … but if I say they are martyrs that means I am telling them to go ahead and commit suicide, he said.
The bodies of 26 Egyptians were recovered from the Italian coast after their boat sank and returned home on Nov. 8.
At a press conference on Tuesday, the country s mufti denied charges that political or government pressure was brought to bear on religious authorities to issue fatwas, or religious edicts.
