Egypt's grand imam passed away in Saudi Arabia where he will be buried in Madina , rector of Al-Azhar, passed away yesterday in the Saudi capital of Riyadh following a heart attack. He was 81. Tantawi had been at the helm of Sunni Islam's most prestigious institution since 1996, when he succeeded the hardline but respected Sheikh Gad El-Haq Ali Gad El-Haq. Prior to his appointment Tantawi served as Egypt's mufti for a decade, chalking up 24 years in public office. While the mufti is appointed by the president and can be replaced at any time, the sheikh of Al-Azhar, also a presidential appointee, remains in office for life. Tantawi's deputy and former mufti Mohamed Farid Wasel will take charge of Al-Azhar institute until the new sheikh of Al-Azhar is appointed. Speculation was rife Wednesday as to who will succeed Tantawi. Other than Wasel, the current mufti, Ali Gomaa, and Ahmed El-Tayeb, president of Al-Azhar University and a member of the ruling National Democratic Party's Supreme Committee, have been mentioned. Traditionally, it is the mufti who is usually appointed to the post. Tantawi's years as sheikh of Al-Azhar were marked by controversy. In November 2008 he was in the headlines after shaking hands with Israeli President Shimon Perez at a UN sponsored meeting. The handshake outraged sections of Egypt's intelligentsia and opposition politicians who viewed it as an act of normalisation, triggering demands that Tantawi be removed from office. Tantawi's response was to say he was unaware at the time of the identity of the person whose hand he shook and that even had he known and refused the Palestinian question would be no closer to being resolved. Last year Tantawi hit the headlines again when he visited an Azhar girls' school in Cairo and found a young teenage student in the niqab. He ordered her to remove the face cover, reportedly describing her as not pretty enough to want to conceal her face. Tantawi later banned the niqab from Al-Azhar educational institutes. He also supported a French decision last year to ban the niqab in official public places. Tantawi earned a reputation for being a liberal as both mufti and sheikh of Al-Azhar. He supported the payment of interest on deposits, a contentious issue among Muslim scholars. He was also known for his temper. One famous incident illustrating his irritability occurred in 1997 when he was being interviewed by a journalist in his office. An angry Tantawi took off his shoes and chased the journalist around the office to beat him. The interview was about Tantawi's reception of Israel's chief Rabbi in Al-Azhar. His support for organ transplants and denunciation of female circumcision drew criticism from conservative Islamic circles. His criticism of suicide operations carried out by the Palestinian resistance against the Israeli occupation triggered the wrath of far more people, from the political left, right and centre. Despite the controversies Tantawi is respected for his scholarly work, especially an acclaimed exegesis of the Quran which even his strongest critics applaud as exceptional. Tantawi was born in 1928 in the village of Selim Al-Sharqiya in the Upper Egyptian governorate of Sohag, hence the distinct saaidi accent that he maintained till his death. He graduated from the Faculty of Osoul Al-Din (Theology) in 1959 and went on to complete a PhD in Tafseer and Hadeeth (Explaining the Quran and the Prophet's sayings). Tantawi was appointed as a professor at Al-Azhar's Faculty of Osoul Al-Din in 1968, then promoted to faculty dean in Assiut in 1976. He was seconded to teach at Iraq's Baghdad and Basra universities and later at the Islamic University in Libya. Between 1980 and 1984 he was head of the post-graduate studies department at the Islamic University in Madina, Saudi Arabia. He subsequently became dean of the School of Islamic and Arabic Studies in Egypt where he served for just a year before being appointed as mufti. At the request of his family Tantawi will be buried in Baqee tomb, one of the holiest spots in Madina, where followers of the Prophet Mohamed are buried. He is survived by three children.
