Cairo: Egyptian authorities Wednesday banned popular Muslim cleric, Mohammad Jebril, from working in mosques across the country after he delivered a controversial sermon.
Minister of Waqfs (religious endowments), Mohammad Jumaa, said that Jebril would be barred from delivering sermons and leading prayers in all mosques of Egypt allegedly for manipulating prayers for political gains.
“Anyone helping Jebril to lead prayers, giving sermons or teaching lessons in mosques will face firm measures,” Jumaa said without elaborating.
The Ministry of Waqf meanwhile said that the ban took immediate effect to “make him [Jebril] an example for anyone exploiting God’s sharia law”.
There was no comment from the 51-year-old cleric.
Earlier this week, Jebril, a prominent reciter of the Holy Koran and a preacher, led thousands of Muslims in the famous Amr Ibn Al Aas Mosque in southern Cairo in performing Taraweeh, a nightly prayer offered in the holy month of Ramadan.
In a concomitant sermon, he invoked God’s wrath against what he termed “corrupt media, politicians and shaikhs of the sultan [ruler]” and called for the release of detainees.
His prayer was widely interpreted as targeting government’s loyalists in favour of the now-outlawed Muslim Brotherhood.
Thousands of the Brotherhood’s followers have been rounded up since 2013 when the army toppled president Mohammad Mursi, a senior leader in the Islamist group, following enormous street protests against his rule.
The government has since sought to tighten grip on mosques, denying the Brotherhood and allied groups a major forum to influence devout Muslims.
