Sheikh Ahmed Deedat debates with the American soldiers of the First Gulf War in Saudi Arabia.

He was none other than Sheikh Ahmed Deedat, reverently known and called UNCLE by those who hold him in high esteem and admiration.

Sheikh Deedat was more a scholar of the Bible than the Qur'an, and was more familiar and adroit with its teachings. He had an insight and perspective of the Bible which made many Christians he came into contact with rethink and re-examine their faith, particularly those aspects of the Bible and the Qur'an that deal with the divine mission and life of Prophet Jesus.

On May 3, 1996, Sheikh Ahmed Deedat suffered a stroke which left him paralyzed from the neck down, and also meant that he could no longer speak or swallow. He was flown to a hospital in Riyadh, where he was taught to communicate through a series of eye-movements. He spent the last nine years of his life in a bed in his home in Verulam, South Africa, encouraging people to engage in da'wah. He continued to receive hundreds of letters of support from around the world. During these years, rumors spread throughout the Internet that he was already dead, and even some websites that contained his pamphlets mentioned as early as 2002 that he was dead.

On August 8, 2005, Ahmed Deedat finally succumbed to his prolonged illness and died at his home in Trevennen Road, Verulam in the province of KwaZulu Natal.

"To him we belong to him is our return