Controversial Muslim cleric Sheik Taj el-Din al Hilaly has declared himself more Australian than Prime Minister John Howard. Speaking to The Australian newspaper from The Australian Federal Police is investigating $70,000 raised by the Sydney-based Lebanese Muslim Association (LMA) and handed out in Lebanon by Sheik al Hilali. LMA president Tom Zreika has said allegations have been made in the Muslim community that Sheik al Hilali gave some of the money to Hezbollah leader Hassan Nasrallah. "When I get back to Sydney, I will be asking how this money was accounted for," Sheik al Hilali told the newspaper. "I get accused in the media of spending the money, but at the end of the day I don't know how the money was spent. I was just writing down the names on a piece of paper."
Sheik Al Hilali said his widely criticised remarks supporting the hardline Iranian regime were meant to encourage world peace. Both the government and opposition called for the sheik to be sacked and to leave the country after he called on Australian Muslims to back Iran's hardline regime. Sheik al Hilali told the newspaper he had spent 50 years promoting peace and accused the Prime Minister of running a dictatorship. "It's a disgrace for the leader of a democratic country to be picking on religious people, especially one who is practicing a form of dictatorship that could almost be Saddam Hussein-like," Sheik al Hilali said. "I respect Australian values more than he does. Australian people like peace and they like humanitarian welfare and they are attracted to just causes."