Top Muslim body condemns Kenya massacre

Al-Azhar slams jihadist attack on university that killed 148; terrorists said to have taunted Christian before murdering them

By AFP 5 April 2015, 5:34 pm

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Ahmed el-Tayeb the grand sheik of Cairo's Al-Azhar, the pre-eminent theological institute of Sunni Islam, talks to the media in Cairo, Egypt. (photo credit: AP)

CAIRO, Egypt — The Cairo-based top Sunni Muslim body al-Azhar on Saturday condemned the massacre of nearly 150 people at Kenya’s Garissa University by Somalia’s al-Shabab Islamists.

Four terrorists from the al-Qaeda-linked group killed 148 people, 142 of them students, and wounded at least 79 at Garissa university after a day-long siege on Thursday.

The terrorists, who were all killed, spared Muslim students but taunted Christian students before killing them, survivors said. (A report that Jewish students were among the dead, contained in an earlier version of this AFP article, was erroneous, AFP subsequently made clear to The Times of Israel.)

“Al-Azhar condemns the terrorist act committed by Somalia’s al-Shabab terrorist group in the Kenyan university of Garissa that left about 150 victims, and wounded tens of innocent students,” the prestigious seat of Sunni Islamic learning said in a statement on its Facebook page.

The attack, Kenya’s deadliest since the 1998 bombing of the US embassy in Nairobi, sparked international outrage, with Pope Francis condemning the massacre as an act of “senseless brutality”.