Between June 6 and 13 a group of students of the Faculty of Catholic Theology at Aachen University, Germany, visited Egypt, obtaining support from the Centre for Arab-West Understanding in organizing their program in Egypt that was entirely focused on the role of religion in Egyptian society, including, of course, Muslim-Christian relations. Our NGO asked Dr. Ḥassan Muḥammad Wajīh Ḥassan to meet the students on June 8 and speak about his experiences in Muslim-Christian dialogue. Some students asked questions about the period of the Muslim Brotherhood's rule in Egypt. Dr. Wajīh provided Dialogue Across Borders with a text he posted on July 1, 2021, on Facebook. That text in turn refers to an article he published on December 12, 2006, in al-Akhbār. We translated this article into English which was edited by Dr. Ḥassan Wajīh.

Azhar University has more than 400,000 students and more than fifteen thousand faculty members. It is thus not surprising that one finds students and faculty of different modes of thought, including students and faculty sympathizing with the Muslim Brotherhood. In 2006 students associated with the Muslim Brotherhood shocked the Azhar and Egypt in general with a demonstration that they had formed a militia in line with statements of the General Guide of the Brotherhood that he was preparing his militia in Egypt, claiming he started with the training of ten thousand fighters.

In other words, the Muslim Brotherhood is not a benign organization. They have had for decades the desire to grab power in Egypt and turn Egypt into a country ruled by them according to their interpretation of Islamic scriptures. The Muslim Brotherhood is well organized, but they form a minority among Egyptian Muslims or students at the Azhar.