Egyptian Salafist Wants To Destroy The Pyramids and Sphinx

Usually Muslim extremists have a penchant for destroying historical sites of other religions, like the Buddhas of Bamiyan in Afghanistan in 2011, but occasionally they go hog-wild and destroy some of their own. Take the Islamists in northern Mali that have systematically destroyed a bunch of mausolea of various Muslim saints in the world heritage site of Timbuktu.

Now some Egyptian Salafist ignoramus (involved with the Taliban destruction of the Buddhas) wants to destroy the pyramids of Giza (one of which is considered one of the Seven Wonders of The World) and the Great Sphinx.

Murgan Salem al-Gohary told Egypt’s privately-owned Dream TV2 channel over the weekend that the Sphinx and pyramids are “idolatrous” and must be destroyed, Egyptian daily al-Masry al-Youm reported.

The newspaper said Gohary is a jihadist leader with links to the Taliban and that he had previously helped smash Buddha statues in Afghanistan ten years ago.

“The idols and statutes that fill Egypt must be destroyed. Muslims are tasked with applying the teachings of Islam and removing these idols, just like we did in Afghanistan when we smashed the Buddha statues,” Gohary said in a Saturday night television interview, according to al-Masry al-Youm.

Who lets these people have access to the airwaves?

Gohary had spent time in prison during Hosni Mubarak's reign, but after his release travelled to Afghanistan, then Syria, where he was sent back to Egypt.

The Egyptian Interior Ministry claims they have:

“taken the necessary precautions to prevent violations of the law or any abuses of anything in the public domain or archaeological treasures including the pyramids."

But the Coalition to Support Tourism (CST) doesn't believe the government has done enough, and are planning on suing President Morsi and the tourism minister for "lack of response" if nothing is done.  After all, the economy in Egypt is a mess and what else do they have other than tourism?