Al-Qaeda elements blew up on Monday a number of Sufi shrines in the Modiyah district of Abyan province, southern Yemen.
Local sources in the province reported that al-Qaeda elements placed explosives under the tomb of a Sufi scholar, Ali bin Hilal, and another known as Ubaid bin Ahmed, in Al-Madara area, and demolished them on the pretext of heresy and ‘haram’ (prohibited).
Observers see the Al-Qaeda elements’ destruction of shrines in the Modiyah district as a declaration of their control over it, after they attacked a number of security headquarters last March.
Terrorist elements likely to belong to the “Al-Amaliqa Brigades”, which were formed from extremist Salafist elements, spread in Modiyah, after hundreds of elements spread in Al-Mahfad and Ma’jala areas, the most prominent former stronghold of the organization in Abyan.
In December 2021, the extremist elements of the “Al-Amaliqa” blew up one of the tombs, and before that Al-Balkhi Mosque in Hays district in Hodeida province, whose foundation dates back to the era of the apostolic state.
