Dubai, United Arab Emirates (CNN) – The International Astronomy Center said, on Wednesday, that seeing the crescent of the month of Shawwal (in the Hijri calendar), Thursday, is not possible with the naked eye in the Arab world, in a statement that follows the announcement of the Saudi Astronomical Society in Jeddah, on Monday, “Astronomical calculations indicate that, next Friday, it will be the first day of Shawwal,” according to what was quoted in a statement by the Saudi Press Agency (SPA).
And the Astronomy Center said in a statement signed by 25 experts and published on its official website: “It is not hidden from anyone that the confusion currently taking place in the talk about seeing the crescent of Eid on the evening of next Thursday, April 20, 2023 AD, between what is certain that it will be seen and the feast will be on Friday and another confirms that the crescent It will not be seen. The aim of this statement is not to specify the expected day of Eid al-Fitr, as it is linked to multiple factors between jurisprudence and science, but rather the purpose of this statement is to clarify some scientific facts related to the issue of sighting the crescent.”
And the center continued in its statement: “All criteria, old and new, show that seeing the crescent on Thursday is not possible with the naked eye from the Arab world. This expectation is not an opinion of a person or a party, but rather a consensus by specialists who satiated this issue with research, and published research on it in periodicals.” Among those whose names were mentioned are heads of scientific committees in the International Astronomical Union, and among them are directors of observatories, one of which is one of the greatest observatories in the world, namely the Greenwich Observatory! 2023 AD.
The Observatory pointed out its statement, saying, “Let’s look at the position of the crescent on Thursday, April 20, in some Arab and Islamic cities at sunset: in Jakarta, the moon is 2.7 degrees away from the sun at that time (the internationally agreed “Dangoon” limit is 6 degrees). And in Abu Dhabi, it is far from the sun. 4.7 degrees. In Makkah Al-Mukarramah, it is 5.1 degrees from the sun. In Jerusalem, the moon is 5.4 degrees from the sun. In Cairo, the moon is 5.5 degrees from the sun. In Dakar (Senegal), the moon is 8.0 degrees from the sun, and it can be seen with instruments.
And he added: “In view of all the scientific standards considered for the crescent and published in peer-reviewed periodicals, we would like to point out that seeing the crescent is not possible with the naked eye in the Arab or Islamic world, and is not possible even using the telescope in most of it, and most of them are less than the limit of Danjon … and for countries that suffice. The moon sets after the sun mathematically, and it is not required to see the crescent, or it is sufficient to see it from any place in the world that shares with it at night, so it is perfectly correct that Eid al-Fitr be on Friday, April 21.. As for countries that stipulate (correct) local sighting with the naked eye only, Or countries located in Asia and accept local vision with a telescope, so it is assumed that the Ramadan kit will be 30 days and that Eid Al-Fitr will be on Saturday, April 22.
He added: “However, confusion occurs because of testimonies of seeing the crescent with the naked eye, which specialists know are wrong. Indeed, there are many studies that show statistics of these errors across the Arab world, and in previous years they came at times when the crescent was not present in the sky at that time. For example, the year 2007 A.D. 10 people from four regions witnessed the sighting of the crescent of Eid Al-Fitr, even though the moon on that day set three minutes before the sun! That the moon on that day sets 25 minutes before the sun!And there are many other examples of such cases.Because of the repetition of these false testimonies, some doubted the accuracy of the astronomical calculations, and these testimonies were inferred to defame the astronomical calculations in general and the astronomical standards for sighting the crescent in particular, as they indicate To those “observations” that “occurred repeatedly” with values lower than what the standards stipulate, and with a large number of witnesses, and this is an invalid martyrdom, as we indicated (because of the error of those observations).
