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By Ajnadin Mustafa.
Tripoli, 21 August 2014:
The Grand Mufti, Sheikh Sadik Al-Ghariani, has again come out firmly in favour of Operation Dawn . . .[restrict]in Tripoli and Islamists in Benghazi, stating that no one should take a neutral position between them.
The Zintani Qaaqaa and Sawaq brigades and their allies in Tripoli and the Operation Dignity forces of retired General Khalifa Hafter in Benghazi were remnants of the Qaddafi regime and enemies of the revolution, he claimed. They were thieves who were responsible for all Libya’s miseries, he declared.
By contrast, the revolutionaries in Tripoli and the Revolutionaries Shoura Council of Benghazi (the umbrella organisation linking Ansar Al-Sharia, the 17 February Brigade and other Islamist bodies) were to be supported. The media and politicians had to stop taking an impartial line when speaking about the two sides, he insisted. They had to defend the revolutionaries and Islamists.
Ghariani who has spent the last three months in London, ostensibly for medical treatment, has roused fury among many Libyans who accuse him of inciting violence with his support for one side in the current crisis rather than promoting reconciliation. Some have gone so far as to suggest that he should be arrested and put on trial.
Several members of the House of Representatives as well as a number of religious scholars are meanwhile demanding he be sacked and a new Dar Al-Ifta be established which would be allowed to issue fatwas only if agreed by at least three out of a five member council, rather than by one man.
It is reported that the House will discuss Ghariani and a new fatwa body shortly. For his part, Ghariani has dismissed the House as illegitimate. [/restrict]
