Over the last few weeks, Sayyed Imam Al-Sharif, one of the least public yet most important figures in the global jihad movement, has published a long-awaited new work, Wathiqat Tarshid Al-'Aml Al-Jihadi fi Misr w'Al-'Alam ("Document of Right Guidance for Jihad Activity in Egypt and the World"), in which he calls for a stop to jihad activities in the West and also to those against the ruling regimes in Muslim countries. The new book, which Imam wrote while serving a life sentence in Egypt, was published in serial form in two Arab dailies, the Kuwaiti Al-Jarida and the Egyptian Al-Masri Al-Yawm, and has been the subject of extensive discussion and polemic among Islamists and observers of Islamist movements. The document is at once a book and a formal initiative, and the majority of leaders and members of the Jihad organization in the Egyptian prisons have signed the document and promised to stop armed activities. This entire process was facilitated by the Egyptian authorities, and the document was reviewed by a commission of Al-Azhar scholars....
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