Political Differences behind Division in Muslim World: Malaysian Scholar

TEHRAN (IQNA) – A Malaysian scholar says differences and divisions between Muslim nations are mainly caused by political differences between countries.

“We, Muslims across the world, should gather to confront challenges ahead of Islamic unity,” professor Mohamed Fouzi bin Zakaria told IQNA on the sidelines of the 36th International Islamic Unity Conference in Tehran.

He is a retired professor of University Malaya’s Academy of Islamic Studies.

“The major problem of Muslims is this division,” he said, highlighting, “The reason for this division is political differences.”

The 36th International Islamic Unity Conference was held in the Iranian capital on October 12-14.

Some 200 foreign guests from 60 countries and 100 Iranian guests addressed the conference in person and virtually.

The International Islamic Unity Conference is annually held in Iran by the World Forum for Proximity of Islamic Schools of Thought (WFPIST) on the occasion of Islamic Unity Week.

Unity can confront Israeli normalization

Pointing to the issue of normalization of ties with the Israeli regime, which has been one of the topics of the conference, the scholar named Islamic unity as the approach to confronting this trend.

“The practical solution to confront the compromise with the Zionist enemy is to have unity among Muslim nations and cling to divine rope,” he said. 

“We have a shared enemy in front of us and that is Zionism,” he said, clarifying that “Zionism” does not mean Judaism.

The United Arab Emirates and Bahrain signed United States-brokered agreements with Israel to normalize their ties with the regime back in September 2020. Two other Arab states, namely Sudan and Morocco, followed suit soon afterward.

The normalization deals have sparked widespread condemnations from the Palestinians as well as nations and human rights advocates across the globe, especially within the Muslim world.

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