Rabat- The United Arab Emirates added Moroccan cleric Dr. Ahmad Raissouni, Vice President of the International Union of Muslim Scholars, to a list of 83 terrorists and terrorist organizations released on November 15.
The Moroccan scholar was listed along with the Muslim Brotherhood, the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant (ISIL), Al Qaeda, and the Houthi rebels in Yemen.
In a move that drew immediate denials from various Muslim organizations, the UAE included the names of several prominent Muslims leaders like Yusuf al-Qaradawi, the Egyptian Islamic theologian and chairman of the International Union of Muslim Scholars.
Commenting the UAE government’s list, the Raissouni told Alyoum24, “These illiterates have been trying for several years to make for themselves a better place and an important role in this world.”
Raissounni, who is also the leader of the Tawheed (unification) Movement and Reform, added that the Emirati authorities, whom he described as “politically illiterate,” have “exhausted all their tools, and now began to resort to suicidal operations against all that is Islamic, fair, and noble, so they might draw the world’s attention.”
The UAE also named the Council on American-Islamic Relations, also known as CAIR, and the Muslim American Society as terrorist groups.
According to the Businessweek, CAIR said in an e-mail statement “There is absolutely no factual basis for the inclusion CAIR and other American and European civil rights and advocacy groups on this list.”
The controversial list of terrorist groups comes after the UAE implemented draconian policies at home and abroad in an attempt to counter the spread of political Islam.
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