Last Friday, Egypt was hit with devastation as the al Rawdah Sufi mosque in Bir al-Abed was attacked by extremists who killed 305 worshipers (27 children were among the dead). The attack began with a bomb exploding as people were finishing their Friday prayers. Militants opened gunfire as worshipers tried to escape. It is the deadliest ever attack on civilians in Egypt’s modern history. In the wake of this horror, British scholar Dr. Ha Hellyer has written an op-ed for the Guardian stating that “the primary target of radical Islamist groups is, and always has been, other Muslims.”
He continues: “Muslims are the principal victims – and Muslims, more than any other group, are the ones who are fighting them more than anyone else. Rather than problematise them, we ought to recognise that Muslims are an integral – the most fundamental – part of the campaign against radical extremism…
There is one more point that must be emphasized. These types of radical groups are not focused on one type of victim. Rather, they have now shown beyond doubt that they are willing to attack all whom they deem to be in the way of the fulfilment of their goals – Muslim and non-Muslims alike. This kind of scourge, alas, has been at work for a long while and mosques in Iraq are in ruins because of it.”
