CAIRO: Egypt's Islamic Research Center, led by Sheikh of al-Azhar Ahmed al-Tayeb, is demanding that United States Christian television station al-Karma of insulting Islam and inciting religious violence in the country. The offshoot of the Sunni Islamic world's leading religious institution has also demanded that it be taken off air over what it described as “offensive” material directed at Muslims, daily al-Ahram newspaper reported on Thursday. The Karma television channel is broadcasted into Egypt by the country's state-run NileSat, thus making a potential case against the channel easier to ultimately remove the channel from Egyptian households. The channel, however, is not among the most watched in Egypt, even among the Christian population. “I have never heard of it, so maybe it isn't really a big thing, but if al-Azhar is trying to attack it then who knows,” said Noha Fahmy, a young Coptic Christian woman living in Cairo. “To be honest, the more these kind of lawsuits happen the more divisions it will create,” she told Bikyamasr.com. The Christian community in Egypt, predominantly Coptic Christian, account for some 10 percent of Egypt's 80 million population and have long demanded better treatment and an end to what they have called “marginalization” by the majority Muslim population. On October 9, thousands of Christians took to the streets in Cairo after a series of church attacks in the south of the country demanding greater rights. The military opened fire on the protesters and ran them over with armored vehicles outside the state television building in what has become known as the “Maspero Massacre.” At least 27 people were killed in the violence, which the military claims was not done by their soldiers, despite video online showing the opposite. BM ShortURL: http://goo.gl/pe7GS Tags: Azhar, Christian TV, featured, Islamic Research Center, Maspero Section: Egypt, Latest News, Media, Religion
