Jama'a al-Islamiya hinted Friday that it may be willing to resort to violence in order to see Sharia adopted in the latest draft of the constitution from the Constituent Assembly.
The group called on Egyptians to collect funds for what it described as a battle against “secularists and liberals.”
Jama'a al-Islamiya leader Mohamed Salah is a member of the Jurisprudence Commission for Rights and Reform, which is comprised of a number of Islamist figures, including Khairat al-Shater, deputy supreme guide of the Muslim Brotherhood.
Salah said during a conference in the Ain Shams neighborhood that Egyptians should “support Islamic Sharia in the Egyptian constitution,” and that “Jama'a al-Islamiya will fight for the application of God’s law, even if that requires bloodshed.”
He called on Islamist movements to organize mass demonstrations to “trap secularists inside the place where the Constituent Assembly holds its meetings, so that everyone knows that the people want an Islamist [state].”
He also demanded that President Mohamed Morsy issue a decree to “defeat the schemes of liberals to reject the law of God.”
He stressed that the referendum on the constitution in its current form is forbidden by Islam, calling on the Egyptian people to “[wage] jihad and fight in support of Sharia.”
Assem Abdel Meguid, leader of Jama’a al-Islamiya’s political arm, the Construction and Development Party, said that “the conference is the first step to announce the rejection of the second article [of the constitution] in its current form.”
He noted that the next step would be mobilizing millions for jihad with their lives and money in the battle to support Sharia.
He stressed on the need to unite the Islamist currents to face the liberal and secular groups that “implement Western agendas.”
Sheikh Abdel Akher Hammad, a member of the group’s Shura Council, called on group members to “mobilize themselves and get ready for the battle of applying Sharia, in the case of [the second article] remaining as it is.”
Hammad condemned what he called “the fear of Islamist members at the Constituent Assembly from secularists.”
Hammad added that Al-Azhar does not want to apply Islamic law, that the sheikh of Al-Azhar attacked Salafis on various satellite channels.
He called on Egyptians called to “donate and raise funds to be used in the battle for supporting Sharia in the constitution.”
