DUBAI-Iran’s Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei questioned Saudi Arabia’s fitness to oversee Islam’s holiest places and accused the kingdom’s rulers of murder in last year’s deadly hajj pilgrimage stampede. The Grand Mufti said that their “enmity to Islam, especially the Sunnis, is very old”.
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As the two leading powers in the Middle East, Shiite Iran and predominantly Sunni Saudi Arabia are at odds over a raft of regional issues, notably the conflicts in Syria and Yemen in which they support opposing sides.
At least 2,297 pilgrims were killed in a stampede at the hajj in 2015, with Iranians making up the bulk of the victims.
Iranian honor guard carries caskets of pilgrims, killed in a crush at the annual Hajj pilgrimage, on October 3, 2015 at Tehran’s Mehrabad Airport.
Ayatollah Khamenei further stressed, “The world of Islam, including Muslim governments and peoples, must familiarize themselves with the Saudi rulers and correctly understand their blasphemous, faithless, dependent and materialistic nature”.
“Prince Salman will instruct the Saudi Arabia foreign minister to meet to discuss the Hajj quota”, she said.
The Iranian leader claimed that the Saudis had “locked up” the wounded with corpses during the…
This year it begins on 11 September but Iranians will not participate.
Saudi Arabia immediately lashed back.
In late May, Saudi Arabia and Iran failed to reach a deal on arrangements for Iranians to attend this year’s pilgrimage to Mecca, with officials from both countries trading accusations on who was to blame for the impasse. Performing Hajj is one of the most integral rights of being a Muslim, one that must not be taken away from Iranians regardless of the official position of the Iranian state.
And he accused the nation of trying to politicize Hajj, using it as an opportunity to “violate the teachings of Islam, through shouting slogans and disturbing the security of pilgrims”.
In a message on the occasion earlier on Monday, Ayatollah Khamenei strongly slammed “murderous” Saudi rulers for refusing to allow an global probe into last year’s deadly Mina crush, urging Muslims to “correctly understand their (Saudis’) blasphemous, faithless, dependent and materialistic nature”.
Iran’s supreme leader on Monday said Saudi Arabian authorities “murdered” Muslim pilgrims who were injured during last year’s hajj stampede.
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Saudi Arabia has introduced new safety measures for the hajj this year, including electronic wristbands for pilgrims to better manage the flow of people along the pilgrimage route.
