RIYADH // King Salman on Sunday vowed to punish those responsible for a suicide bombing that killed 21 people at a Shiite mosque, calling it a “heinous terrorist attack” contrary to Islamic and human values.
The Saudi monarch made the pledge hours after the interior ministry confirmed that Friday’s attack in the village of Al Qudeeh in the eastern Qatif region was the work of an ISIL militant, backing up an earlier claim of responsibility by the extremist group.
“Every participant, planner, supporter, collaborator or sympathiser with this heinous crime will be held accountable, tried and punished,” King Salman said in a message addressed to Crown Prince Mohammed bin Nayef, the deputy prime minister and minister of interior.
“Our efforts will never stop ... fighting the deviant thought, confronting the terrorists and wiping out their hotbeds.”
The interior ministry identified the bomber as Saudi citizen Saleh bin Abdulrahman Al Qashaami in a statement carried by the official Saudi Press Agency late on Saturday.
Al Qashaami was wanted for being a member of an ISIL-linked terrorist cell, the ministry said. Lab tests showed that the explosive used in the bombing was a military-grade compound known as RDX.
The attack was the deadliest assault by militants in the kingdom since a 2004 Al Qaeda attack on foreign worker compounds.
Unlike that attack, Friday’s strike targeted members of Saudi Arabia’s Shiite minority – a sect that both ISIL and ultraconservatives in Saudi Arabia regularly denounce as heretics.
A statement from ISIL’s Al Bayan radio station posted on militant websites on Saturday said a new branch of the group was behind the attack, which it said was carried out by a Saudi going by the nom de guerre Abu Amer Al Najdi.
The ISIL’s activities are primarily focused on Iraq and Syria. Its claim of responsibility for Friday’s strike and the official Saudi confirmation bolster concerns it has established a toehold inside the kingdom, as it has done in Libya and Egypt’s Sinai Peninsula.
The extremist group warned of more “black days” for Shiites in Saudi Arabia, a member of the US-led coalition targeting ISIL.
The Saudi interior ministry said the group also was responsible for shooting dead a police officer in Riyadh earlier this month. It said five members of an ISIL cell killed Pvt Majed Ayedh Al Ghamdi and burned his body. Authorities recovered guns, ammunition, explosives and other items from a farm linked to the militants, it said.
* Associated Press