Anas Schakfeh

from Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Anas Schakfeh (born March 6, 1943 in Hama , Syria ) was President of the Islamic Faith Community in Austria (IGGiÖ) from 1999 to 2011 .

Live and act

Schakfeh grew up in Syria , where he completed a seminar for imams in the city of Hama . He came to Austria in 1964 to take up medicine and Arabic studies at the University of Vienna. In 1977 he passed the interpreting examination as a court sworn interpreter of the Arabic language and worked from 1978 to 1985 as head of an Arabic language course at the Afro-Asian Institute in Vienna, later also as an AHS teacher for Islamic religion. In 1980 he became an Austrian citizen. In 1997, after Ahmad Abelrahimsai fell ill, Shakfeh was appointed Managing President of the Islamic Faith Community in Austria (IGGiÖ).

From 1999 to 2011 Schakfeh was IGGiÖ president and at the same time chairman of the community committee of the religious community Vienna, member of the Schura council and chairman of the supreme council. In addition to his voluntary work for the IGGiÖ, Shakfeh also works as an employed school inspector of the IGGiÖ and as a lecturer at the Islamic Religious Education Academy .

Schakfeh is also a consultant in the cultural department of the Saudi Arabian embassy and until 2001 was a freelancer for the Arab service of Radio Austria International .

In October 2007 Schakfeh announced that he would no longer run for the office of president in the next IGGiÖ election and declared that he wanted to withdraw into private life. On October 21, 2008, Federal President Heinz Fischer awarded him the Great Gold Medal of Honor with the Star for Services to the Republic of Austria. Although his term of office had expired in the summer of 2008, Schakfeh continued to serve as President of the Islamic Faith Community until new elections were held on the basis of the new constitution, which has now been approved, and Fuat Sanac was elected as his successor.

After Schakfeh's tenure ended, the political scientist Farid Hafez published “a flattering biography” entitled Anas Schakfeh. The Austrian Face of Islam (2012). It is predominantly "the perspective of Schakfeh himself presented".

Positions

Schakfeh was u. a. involved in the development of curricula and teaching materials for teaching Islam in schools in Austria. The textbook "Permitted and forbidden in Islam" by the well-known Islamist Yusuf al-Qaradawi was used , which emphasizes that only Allah can say what is allowed and what is forbidden and that laws should be rejected by people. The book also contains homophobic passages and passages in which women are prescribed “Islamic clothing” and visiting public baths is forbidden. In response to external pressure, President Schakfeh withdrew the book after it had been used in teaching for ten years.

He calls for the proportion of children whose mother tongue is not German to be limited in order to maintain the ability to integrate .

As the main initiator and organizer, he organized the first European imams' conference in Graz in June 2003, which passed the "Graz Declaration", which, among other things, superseded the medieval thesis of the division of the world into the House of War and the House of Islam as outdated and theologically unjustifiable explained.

The Austrian Imams Conference of 2005 also goes back to his initiative, which also published a final declaration which proclaimed the secular order of the democratic constitutional state to be fundamentally compatible and compatible with the principles of Islam.

A clear commitment to democracy and the rule of law as well as to a European Islam also contains the final declaration of the 3rd European Imams Conference, which he co-initiated, which took place on 14th / 15th May 2010 took place in Vienna.

On the occasion of Austria's EU Presidency , with the support of the Austrian Foreign Ministry and the City of Vienna, he convened a large conference of European imams and Muslim pastors in Vienna in April 2006, whose final declaration (Vienna Declaration) underlined the equality of women in the Muslim community Has condemned terrorism, fundamentalism and violence against the civilian population and advocated dialogue and the peaceful coexistence of religions and cultures.

Schakfeh also repeatedly expressed himself on current political issues, whereby he v. a. sharply criticized US Middle East policy and Israel. The last time he said in January 2009 that he supported a demonstration against the Israeli crackdown in Gaza. In this context, he declared Hamas' threat to wipe the State of Israel off the map as a utopia . No state has a “natural right to exist” and there is no anti-Semitism in the Middle East anyway.

Awards

literature

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ derStandard.at: Fuat Sanac new President of the Islamic Faith Community , June 26, 2011.
  2. ↑ Peter Draxler, Solmaz Khorsand: Almost one for all ( Memento from November 9, 2014 in the Internet Archive ). In: date . October 2006.
  3. ^ Karl Popper Foundation Klagenfurt: Biography Shakfeh
  4. ↑ Stefan Beig: Interview with Günther Ahmed Rusznak ( Memento from September 22, 2007 in the Internet Archive ). In: Wiener Zeitung . January 4, 2007.
  5. ↑ orf.at : Schakfeh withdraws , October 2007. Retrieved on October 17, 2007.
  6. ↑ Presentation of the Great Gold Medal of Honor with the Star to the President of the Islamic Faith Community, Professor Anas Schakfeh.  ( Page no longer available , search in web archives )  Info: The link was automatically marked as defective. Please check the link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. on: Hofburg.at . October 21, 2008. (Laudation) Retrieved January 3, 2009.@1@ 2Template: Dead Link / www.hofburg.at  
  7. ↑ Erich Kocina: New constitution for Muslims: The doors for new elections in the Islamic denomination are now open. But Anas Schakfeh will have to remain president. In: Die Presse.com , November 27, 2009.
  8. ↑ Die Presse : Biography: Anas Schakfeh, as he wants to see himself .
  9. ↑ So Astrid Mattes in: orf.at Schakfeh biography: “Austrian Voice of Islam” .
  10. ↑ Stefan Beig: A Hort of Fundamentalism ( Memento from February 20, 2007 in the Internet Archive ). In: Wiener Zeitung . January 2, 2007.
  11. ↑ Markus Rohrhofer: Schakfeh: Maximum limit for children with a non-German mother tongue . In: The Standard. Print edition 27./28. May 2006.
  12. ^ Final declaration of the Imams Conference in Vienna. ( Memento from July 19, 2011 in the Internet Archive ) on the website of the Islamic Faith Community in Austria.
  13. ↑ Nina Weißensteiner: Anas Schakfeh reprimands Israel for violence. In: The Standard . January 2, 2009.
  14. ↑ List of all decorations awarded by the Federal President for services to the Republic of Austria from 1952 (PDF; 6.9 MB)
  15. ^ Muslims in Austria: Schakfeh honored. on: wien.orf.at , March 19, 2010. Accessed March 22, 2010.

Web links

personal data
SURNAME Schakfeh, Anas
BRIEF DESCRIPTION Syrian-Austrian President of the Islamic Faith Community in Austria
DATE OF BIRTH March 6, 1943
PLACE OF BIRTH Hama , Syria