Al-Azhar headquarters in Cairo
The world’s biggest Islamic Sunni institution said this in a statement on Monday following US President Donald Trump's proposal for forcibly displacing Palestinians to Egypt and Jordan.
On Saturday evening, speaking to reporters aboard Air Force One, Trump said he had told Jordan's King Abdullah II: "I'd love you to take on more because I'm looking at the whole Gaza Strip right now, and it's a mess, it's a real mess."
Trump said he planned to present the same proposal to Egyptian President Abdel-Fattah El-Sisi on Sunday.
However, the Egyptian Ministry of Foreign Affairs said Sunday that Cairo categorically rejects any displacement of Palestinians from their land, be it "short term" or "long term."
“Those attempts come after the occupier's repeated failures to claim Gaza, coupled with over 15 months of unprecedented crimes and massacres witnessed by the world,” Al-Azhar's statement added.
Al-Azhar reaffirmed that Gaza is a Palestinian Arab land and will remain so “by God's will, until the end of times.”
Furthermore, it condemned “the occupying entity and those who back it” for committing murder, causing destruction, and shedding innocent blood to steal the land. It also denounced their continued falsification of history and erasure of facts.
“This occurs amid an unprecedented level of global complicity and a Zionist desire to usurp others' rights, backed by nations that always proclaim their commitment to freedom, democracy, and human rights,” Al-Azhar noted.
It also called on Palestinians to hold steadfastly to their land and stay committed to their cause, which it described as a cause of global justice and honour.
The institution expressed its pride in the Palestinians' heroic resistance against unjust ambitions, blind support to Zionist violations, and malicious schemes to liquidate the Palestinian cause and destabilize the Arab region.
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