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Saturday 30 May 2015 - 15:08 Makkah mean time-12-8-1436
 Dammam (IINA) - Saudi Arabia’s Council of Senior Scholars on Friday condemned the suicide attack near Al-Anoud Mosque in Dammam.
Four people were killed Friday when a car exploded near Al-Anoud Mosque and the militants failed in their bid to hit the mosque after security officials foiled the attack. The blast comes days after a May 22 suicide bombing on a mosque in Al-Qudaih village in Eastern Province killed 21 people. ISIS had also claimed that attack.
In a statement issued on Friday and carried by the Saudi Press Agency, the board said the "terrorist groups behind the ghastly attack on Al-Anoud Mosque and Al-Qudaih's Ali Bin Abi Talib Mosque have exposed their hideous faces." The statement said: "Islam forbids attacking places of worship even in legitimate wars. How can one target mosques in a Muslim society and a country that rules by the Shariah and serves the Two Holy Mosques?” The statement also called for unity to "root out the menace of terrorism from our society." It also reposed full confidence in the Kingdom's "security personnel who are always alert to the dangers posed by deviant forces."
Grand Imam of Egypt’s Al-Azhar mosque also condemned the terror attack targeting worshippers. He said it was necessary for all Muslims to maintain Islamic unit.
A major catastrophe was averted Friday when security forces around Al-Anoud Mosque in Dammam stopped a suicide bomber disguised in women’s clothing from entering the mosque compound. The bomber, however, did succeed in detonating the bomb a little away from the mosque in which at least four persons were killed including the suicide bomber and security personnel. The blast also set several cars ablaze. Alert security forces, in the process, must have saved the lives of hundreds of worshippers inside the mosque as the bomb was of high intensity and was tailor-made to create havoc in a larger area, officials said.
“Authorities have managed to foil a terrorist crime targeting people performing Friday prayers at Al-Anoud Mosque in Dammam,” capital of Eastern Province, said an Interior Ministry spokesman quoted by the Saudi Press Agency. The bomber “detonated the explosive belt he was wearing at the mosque entrance as security officials were on their way to inspect him,” said the spokesman, citing preliminary investigation results.
The explosion went off just as the attacker’s car stopped at a parking lot near the mosque, the spokesman said. The explosion killed the attacker as well as three others and wounded four people, he said. The spokesman had earlier said the car exploded as security officials headed toward it. Other nearby vehicles caught fire. According to unconfirmed reports one of the volunteers of the mosque also died in the explosion.
Residents circulated pictures of the body of a man believed to be the suicide bomber as well as pictures of black clouds of smoke billowing over a parking lot outside the mosque. Video posted on social media showed the congregation inside the mosque reacting with shock and alarm to the noise of the explosion outside the building.
A Daesh statement named the suicide bomber as Abu Jandal Al-Jizrawi and said he had managed to reach his target despite heightened security. Daesh (so-called IS) claimed responsibility for a suicide bombing last week at Ali Bin Abi Talib Mosque in Al-Qudaih town of Qatif that killed 21 and wounded nearly 100 in the bloodiest militant attack in the Kingdom in years.
HA/IINA
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