The PKR president said this when recalling the dialogue on Islam and Confucianism held on Nov 30 in Penang, which was attended by 400 Muslim and 400 Chinese leaders.

Anwar said many of the Chinese leaders had told him that it was their first time attending such a talk.

“That is why, because of the sheer ignorance, there is so much prejudice to the extent that anything you talk about Islam becomes Islamisation or Arabisation,” he said when delivering his keynote address at the International Unity in Diversity Conference here.

However, Anwar did not deny that “there may be some elements” to it.

In the recent controversy sparked by the government’s decision to introduce khat (Jawi caligraphy) in vernacular schools, Chinese educationist group Dong Zong cited research by “some scholars and literary experts” that showed khat had been used as a medium to spread Islam.

The then education minister Maszlee Malik had denied that introducing khat was a form of Islamisation.

Also, late last month, the education ministry dismissed accusations that it was forcing Islamisation on students in public schools and universities, following the leak of a letter allowing a government religious foundation to carry out Islamic programmes there.

The ministry said the permission given to the government’s Islamic Propagation Foundation of Malaysia, or Yadim, was to only involve Muslim students.

On a related matter, Anwar said one could not defeat the purveyors of extremism or terror if one was completely ignorant of Islam.

“You become pretentious talking about Islam, rejecting all extremist views, but you know nothing about Islam.”