Saturday, June 28, 2008

Egypt liberal thinker, Jamal Al-Banna wrote a courageous book on women in Islam. The book burning fanatics of Al-Azhar raised a hue and cry and got the Mubarak tyranny to ban the book. Not a single word about this in the Arabic press, or even in the Western press. The Cairo correspondent of New TV aired a great report on the case. But the reason why Western media are not championing Al-Banna is because he--unlike other Arab liberals--is anti-Israel and critical of U.S. policies and wars in the Middle East.