Global Leadership Emerges for Muslim Moderates

Sheikh Prof. Abdul Hadi Palazzi

Muslim Cleric: Israel is the homeland of Jewish people -Salah Uddin Shoaib Choudhury

Sheikh Prof. Abdul Hadi Palazzi [pictured] is the leader of Italian Muslim Assembly and a co-founder and a co-chairman of the Islam-Israel Fellowship, based on what Palazzi believes are the authentic teachings of Muhammad as expressed in the Koran and the Hadith.

Palazzi accepts Israel's sovereignty over the Holy Land, and says the Koran supports it as the will of God as a necessary prerequisite for the Final Judgment. He accepts Israel's sovereignty over Jerusalem, if the rights of other religions are protected. He quotes the Koran to support Judaism's special connection to the Temple Mount. According to Palazzi, "The most authoritative Islamic sources affirm the Temples,". He adds that Jerusalem is sacred to Muslims because of its prior holiness to Jews and its standing as home to the biblical prophets and kings David and Solomon, all of whom he says are sacred figures also in Islam. He claims that the Koran "expressly recognizes that Jerusalem plays the same role for Jews that Mecca has for Muslims".

When asked whether he see himself as a "Muslim Zionist", he replied:

"If one means a Muslim who supports the right of the Jewish people to have their own independent and sovereign State, who is solidly behind the State of Israel when it is attacked by terror and when its existence in menaced, who thinks that developing friendly relations between the Muslim nations and the State of Israel is in the interest of the Muslims and of human civilization in general, then I think that the label of Muslim Zionist is appropriate."

[Weekly Blitz - Bangladesh]

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