adminSana’a — A suicide bomber struck a mosque in Yemen’s capital yesterday in an attack targeting Shi’ite worshippers that killed at least 25 people and wounded dozens during holiday prayers, medics and witnesses said.
There was no immediate claim of responsibility but Sana’a has been shaken by a string of bombings by the Islamic State jihadist group in recent months targeting Shiites.
Yesterday’s blast ripped through the Balili mosque where Huthi Shi’ite rebels who control Sana’a go to pray, according to witnesses.
It came as Muslims marked Eid al-Adha, the Feast of the Sacrifice, the most important holiday of the Islamic calendar.
Witnesses reported that after a first blast inside the mosque, a suicide bomber detonated an explosives belt at the entrance as worshippers rushed outside. It was not immediately clear if the first blast was also from a suicide bomber.
ISIS, a radical Sunni Muslim group which controls swathes of territory in Iraq and Syria, considers Shi’ites to be heretics. ISIS bomb attacks targeting several Shi’ite mosques in Sana’a on March 21 killed 142 people. The group has also claimed attacks on mosques in Kuwait and Saudi Arabia.
The capital of Sunni-majority Yemen has been under the control of the Iran-backed Huthi rebels for the past year. The insurgents have also expanded their grip to other parts of the country. — AFP
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