Sayyid Al-Qemany (Arabic: سيد محمد القمني, also al-Qimni, 13 March 1947 – 6 February 2022) was an Egyptian secular writer and thinker.
[1][2] A judicial and media campaign was launched calling for the prize to be withdrawn[3] by those who claimed Al-Qemany was a heretic who had harmed Islam and Muslims with his writings.
[5] Former Egyptian Mufti Nasr Farid Wasil called the decision to award Al-Qemany the prize "a crime against Egypt's Muslim identity.
The statements [from Al-Qimni's writings] quoted by the [individual] who requested the fatwa are heretical, regardless of who wrote them; they remove their author from the fold of Islam... and [also] constitute a crime according to Article 98 of [Egypt's] penal code.
It was reported that he participated in a symposium that was held in the Adhoc organization in Belgium, involving not only an insult to the Divine, the Prophet, and his companions, but also expressions of contempt for the Islamic religion.