August 22, 2019

In its latest strategic report, the Global Fatwa Index (GFI), affiliated to Egypt's Dar Al-Ifta, revealed that Egypt's Dar Al-Ifta is the most important fatwa reference for Muslim minorities in the world, surpassing the rest of other religious authorities.

The report mentioned that Egypt's Dar Al-Ifta took the lead in providing Muslim minorities with fatwas through its different official platforms, followed by the Qatari website IslamWeb, then the Fatwa Committee in Germany and finally ASK Imam and Mufti Online sites in South Africa.

The GFI, affiliated to Egypt's Dar Al-Ifta, pointed out that the existence of incompetent fatwa cadres, as well as the limited number of Islamic centers concerned with fatwa issuance in non-Muslim communities pushed Muslims in these places to consult authorized and unauthorized fatwa websites. The weak fatwa references available in foreign languages, the GFI added, led Muslims in non-Muslim communities to use smart phone applications like the Muslim Brotherhood's "Euro Fatwa App", that despite its extremist approach, allowed users in Europe to receive answers to their fatwa requests.

 The GFI explained that the official website of Egypt's Dar Al-Ifta took the lead in fatwa issuance as an authorized reference for Muslim minorities by (45%). According to the report, this leading position is due to several reasons; most notably is publishing all the questions and answers that concern Muslims in non-Muslim communities through the website's "Muslim Minorities" portal as well as publishing the content in 8 foreign languages (Arabic, English, French, German, Russian, Urdu, Turkish and Malay).