Cairo: Grand Imam of Al Azhar Ahmed el Tayyeb congratulated President Abdel Fattah El Sisi and the great Egyptian people on the occasion of Mawlid Al Nabawi anniversary. Tayyeb extended greetings to the Islamic and Arab nation on the same occasion.

According to State Information Service Egypt, in his speech on Wednesday, August 26, 2026, during a ceremony marking the anniversary of the Prophet's birthday in the New Capital, attended by President Abdel Fattah El Sisi, the grand imam said that the world today is in greater need than ever of the guidance of Prophet Muhammad (peace and blessings be upon him) to save it from the mire of psychological and social ailments and moral afflictions in which it has become immersed, as well as from policies of oppression, injustice, and brutality against the poor and vulnerable. These have resulted in economic crises, political turmoil, tensions and conflicts, and the hardships and difficulties of life.

He noted that one of the most serious threats facing humanity in the modern age is the loss of the value of mercy and compassion among human beings.

The grand imam stressed that humanity should draw a lesson from the wars, bloodshed, mutilation, and destruction it is witnessing today-including the destruction of homes and hospitals over children, women, and patients, as well as broken promises and violated agreements.

He said it is difficult to compare the brutality of 21st-century wars with the justice of the wars led by the Prophet whose blessed birth is being commemorated, and later by his caliphs and followers. Such a comparison, he said, is not only difficult to summarize but represents two complete opposites that share no common ground whatsoever.

The Grand Imam of Al-Azhar concluded by saying that comparing the wars of yesterday with those of today is not so much a comparison between the wars of Islam and those of 21st-century civilization as it is an expression of the world's current need for a savior-or, as he put it, a lifeline-to rescue it from sinking further into a galaxy of darkness.

That lifeline, he said, lies in recalling the life of the Prophet of humanity on the anniversary of his birth and drawing light from the human values with which God sent him and which he advised his community, and all other nations, to uphold.