Source: Arab News
At Friday sermons in the holy cities of Makkah and Madinah the imams of the Grand Mosque and the Prophet’s Mosque slammed the “heinous crime” committed by a group of terrorists in Makkah last week, which resulted in the killing of two police officers and five members of the group and the discovery of huge quantities of weapons and explosives.
Imams throughout the Kingdom condemned the incident as unacceptable and urged the authorities to take the necessary measures to end such activities and punish those behind them.
The imam of the Grand Mosque in Makkah, Sheikh Osama Khayat, said no true Muslim would condone what happened in Makkah and earlier in Riyadh, where innocent lives were lost and the security and peace of people shattered.
“This is a terrorist act that neither God nor the Prophet nor any good Muslim would accept. To commit such a crime in the holiest place on earth adds to the gravity of the act, and it must be rejected by everyone. Those individuals have turned Makkah into a haven for manufacturing and stashing of weapons and other means of destruction. They went further in their plot and booby-trapped copies of the Holy Qur’an to cause death by targeting anyone coming close to the Holy Book,” the imam said.
In Madinah, Sheikh Abdul Bari Al-Thubaiti, who led Friday prayers at the Prophet’s Mosque, said Islam rejects any kind of violence and aggression and that the incidents that took place in Riyadh, Makkah and Madinah were a great sin.
“One stands perplexed before this chain of sad events that has not spared the holiest places, where everyone should feel safe and secure,” Al-Thubaiti said.
“Islam totally rejects all such acts where sacred places are desecrated and innocent people killed and threatened. Those behind such acts are driven by deviant thoughts that should not be allowed to flourish in this sacred land,” he added.
