The office of the top Sunni scholar, Shaikh Abdol-Hamid Isma’eelzahi, has refuted some parts of a report broadcasted by Press TV, today 1st Nov. 2013.
The state-run satellite TV channel of Iran, Press TV, conducted an interview with Shaikh Abdol-Hamid Isma’eelzahi on the topic of “Takfir and extremism” in Islam few days ago.
In the report, Press TV linked the words of Shaikh Abdol-Hamid with the ongoing civil war in Syria.
The TV quoted Shaikh untruly as saying: “Molavi Abdolhamid Ismaeelzahi described the militants fighting against the government of Syrian President Bashar al-Assad as “extremist deviants.””
The office of the member of the International Union for Muslim Scholars urged that he never mentioned the name of Syria in his interview.
According to the office, the comments of Shaikh Abdol-Hamid were generally about the phenomena of Takfir in the history of Islam among the both Shia and Sunni sects. He talked about “extremism” in the Muslim world without any allusion to any particular country.
The office expressed its deep regret as a state-run TV channel of the ‘Islamic Republic of Iran’ falsifies reports and links the words of respectable and responsible individulas to what it desires.
“All media sources are supposed to avoid irresponsible reporting and falsified stories as the principles of media suggest,” the statement adds.
The video of Shaikh Abdol-Hamid’s interview is available; soon the viewers can watch the real words of him on his website.
After-note:
After objection of the office of Shaikh Abdol-Hamid to the Press TV about the untrue news story on the ongoing civil war in Syria, the TV modified its report omitting the word Syria. The TV replaced the video of the news with a picture seems to be of Syrian fighters.
Now, the website of the Iranian English TV channel has changed the sentence ‘militants fighting against the government of Syrian President Bashar al-Assad’ to ‘foreign-backed Takfiri militants’ in its modified report.
Obviously, it shows the main purpose of the TV from interviewing ‘a senior Iranian Sunni cleric’.
The word ‘Syria’ can be seen in the link of the report in the address bar: http://www.presstv.ir/detail/2013/11/01/332330/syria-militants-spreading-islamophobia/