The remarks by Grand Mufti Abdulaziz Al Sheikh came a day after Iran’s Ayatollah Ali Khamenei accused Saudi authorities of killing Muslims injured during last year’s crush of crowds at the hajj pilgrimage.
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Tehran:Iranian President Hassan Rouhani today called on the Muslim world to unite and punish the Saudi government for its handling of the hajj pilgrimage and wider actions in the region.
Iran’s supreme leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei blasted the “incompetence” of the Saudi royal family as he met with the families of victims of a deadly stampede during last year’s Hajj. They murdered them. The heartless and murderous Saudis locked up the injured with the dead in containers. Tehran says hundreds of its citizens were killed and Saudi Arabia has lied about the real number of casualties.
Magi, or magus, refers to followers of Zoroastrianism, a monotheistic religion that was prevalent in Iran, Afghanistan, and Central Asia before the rise of Islam in the seventh century.
He adds: “Not just because Iran and Saudi Arabia may end up in a direct conflict, but because fixing Syria and Iraq, and fighting ISIS, would be impossible if these two countries are at one another’s throats”.
“This incident proves once again that this cursed, evil family does not deserve to be in charge and manage the holy sites”, Khamenei said.
“Indeed, no resemblance between Islam of Iranians and most Muslims, and [the] bigoted extremism that Wahhabi top cleric and Saudi terror masters preach”, Zarif tweeted.
“By no means do we want to see this kind of rhetoric that we’ve seen in the last couple of days that will only escalate tensions”, State Department spokesman Mark Toner told reporters.
Answering a question on Iranian media and senior officials blaming Saudi Arabia for not enabling Iranian pilgrims to perform this year’s Haj, he said that Saudi Arabia, since its inception, has been serving the Two Holy Mosques, taking care of pilgrims and providing them all facilities to perform Haj rituals in comfort and safety.
“The Iranian regime is now isolated from the Islamic world”.
“The government of Saudi Arabia must be held accountable for this incident”, Rouhani said Wednesday at a weekly Cabinet meeting, according to the AP. Pilgrims who can not walk are pushed around the mosque in wheelchairs by workers. He argues there is a danger of the ongoing proxy war developing into a direct conflict if world powers do not act to avert it. We have to unite.
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It is the religious duty of all Muslims, those who are physically and financially able, to undertake the trip at least once in their lifetime. Iran had the highest of death toll of any country, with 464 Iranian pilgrims killed.
