Decapitated bodies show up in Egypt Sinai border town
University head replaced after ‘apostacy’ remarks
Egyptian security officials and witnesses say the decapitated bodies of a father and his two sons recently kidnapped by Islamic militants have been found on the street in the northern Sinai town of Rafah. The mother of the two siblings was killed last week by Islamic State group militants when they raided the family home in the village of Yamit and kidnapped the three men. The three decapitated bodies found Saturday were taken to hospital, where they were identified. The officials and witnesses spoke on condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to speak to the media and feared reprisals, respectively. IS is spearheading an insurgency in northern Sinai, where there has recently been an uptick in the abduction and killing of suspected informants.
Egypt’s Al-Azhar university
In another development, the head of Egypt’s Al-Azhar university, one of the world’s leading Islamic seats of learning, has been replaced after labeling a controversial Muslim reformer an apostate, the institution said. The development came as Al-Azhar is pressured by critics who say the venerable Sunni Muslim authority has not done enough to counter Islamist extremism. Ahmed Hosni Taha, the acting university president, had been forced to apologize on Thursday after saying reformer Islam Al-Behairy was an “apostate” for attacking some of the founding scholars of Islamic law.
His apology was followed by a statement on Friday from Al-Azhar saying that Grand Imam Ahmed Al-Tayeb, who heads the institution that runs the university, had replaced Taha.
Taha had made the remarks about Behairy during a television interview. “My response... was incorrect and it contradicts the way of Al-Azhar,” Taha said in an apology posted on the university’s website. Behairy was a talk show host who had infuriated Al-Azhar’s traditional clergy with attacks on canonical religious books and some of Sunni Islam’s most important scholars. — Agencies