EGYPT: Concerns over Iraqi Shiites

The Egyptian interior ministry called on Sunni religious leaders to train state security officers on how to fight the proliferation of Shiite doctrines, according to a news report that appeared Thursday in the well-respected El-Masry El-Youm daily .

The report quoted a prominent scholar at Al-Azhar University as saying that the state security apparatus is concerned about the creeping influence of Shiite Islam since the influx of thousands of Shiite Iraqis to Egypt.

Egypt has been one of the major destinations of Iraqis who fled the violence at home. About 150,000 Iraqis are believed to have moved to Egypt since the 2003 outbreak of the war in Iraq and last year, when Egypt closed its borders.

Sheikh Mohamed Abdel Moneim El-Berry told the paper that his lectures to police officers focused on the dangerous nature of Shiite beliefs and the dire need to protect Egypt’s national security against such a threat. Several Shiite groups have already settled in a number of Egyptian provinces and have filed requests with the government to build their own mosques, added El-Berry.

Egypt has predominantly Sunni Muslims; however, the number of Shiites is estimated at 1% of the country’s 76 million inhabitants. Like other minorities in Egypt, Shiites are usually discriminated against and their loyalty is often questioned.

However, the Sunni-Shiite animosity has recently become more of a sensitive issue in most Sunni Arab countries due to the rising regional influence of Shiite Iran and the growing popularity of Lebanon’s Shiite Hezbollah group.

-- Noha El-Hennawy in Cairo

Photo: Shiite pilgrims visit shrines in Karbala, Iraq. Credit: Getty Images