ISIS has taken a deadly toll in the last 48 hours in the Middle East threatening the security of Gulf Markets and the future of the Middle East.
In Kuwait
The mosque preacher was quoted by state news agency KUNA as saying that the attack targeted worshippers at the back of the mosque, towards the end of the Friday prayers.
It was the first suicide bombing at a Shi’ite mosque in Kuwait and worst militant attack in the country for many years.
Shi’ites comprise between 15 and 30 percent of the predominantly Sunni Muslim Gulf Arab state, where members of both communities are known to live side by side with little apparent friction.
Security forces quickly sealed off the perimeter of the mosque while rescue workers carried the wounded to hospital.
Kuwait National Petroleum Company (KNPC) spokesman Khaled al-Asousi told Reuters that the company was carrying out “extra monitoring and searches” to boost security around oil facilities after the attack.
Islamic State named the bomber as Abu Suleiman al-Muwahed and said in a statement posted on social media that he had targeted a “temple of the rejectionists” — a term it generally uses to refer to Shi’ites, whom it regards as heretics.
Islamic State had urged its followers on Tuesday to step up attacks during the Ramadan fasting month against Christians, Shi’ites and Sunni Muslims fighting with a U.S.-led coalition against the ultra-hardline jihadist group.
Also on Friday, a gunman killed 37 people including Western tourists at a beach resort in Tunisia, and in France a decapitated body covered in Arabic writing was found after an attacker rammed his car into a gas container, triggering an explosion.
There was no evidence the three attacks were deliberately coordinated. But coming so close together on the same day in three countries on three different continents, they underscored the far-reaching, fast-growing influence of Islamic State, Western politicians said.
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The Health Ministry said Kuwait’s blood bank had opened additional centres to receive blood donations and it urged citizens with non-urgent medical needs to avoid the emergency units.
Pictures posted on social media and Kuwaiti news websites showed men in traditional white robes smeared with blood outside the mosque. A second photo showed a row of victims wrapped in white body bags and a third the collapsed ceiling of the mosque.
Kuwait declared Saturday a day of mourning.
Emir Sheikh Sabah al-Ahmed al-Sabah, who visited the damaged mosque after the attack, said the bombing violated the sanctity of the Muslim holy month of Ramadan as well as Islamic law forbidding the shedding of the blood of innocents.
“National unity is a protective fence for the security of the nation,” Sheikh Sabah said.
Prime Minister Sheikh Jaber al-Mubarak al-Sabah, who visited the wounded at the Emiri Hospital, also condemned the bombing as an attempt to jeopardise Kuwait’s national unity.
“This incident targets our internal front, our national unity,” Sheikh Jaber told Reuters outside the hospital. “But this is too difficult for them and we are much stronger than that.”
Islamic State has recently twice targeted Shi’ite mosques in neighbouring Saudi Arabia and carried out attacks against members of the sect’s Zaydi branch in Yemen.
Kuwait recently approved legislation allowing for security cameras to be placed at public places.
Yaqoub Al-Sanea, the minister of justice, religious endowments and Islamic affairs, said that despite Friday’s attack, “Kuwait will remain an oasis of security for all groups of Kuwaiti society and all sects. The government is taking many procedures to protect prayers and mosques.”
In Tunisia
A gunman disguised as a tourist opened fire at a Tunisian hotel on Friday with a rifle he had hidden in an umbrella, killing 39 people including Britons, Germans and Belgians as they lounged at the beach in an attack claimed by Islamic State.
Terrified tourists ran for cover after the gunfire and an explosion erupted at the Imperial Marhaba in Sousse, 140 km (90 miles) south of the capital Tunis, before police shot the gunman dead, witnesses and security officials said.
The bodies of several tourists lay crumbled where they fell in the sand, covered with yellow towels and blankets among the plastic white sunbeds. Blood smeared stone steps leading from the hotel main area.
In Syria
Islamic State fighters killed at least 145 civilians in an attack on the Syrian town of Kobani and a nearby village, in what a monitoring group described on Friday as one of the worst massacres carried out by the hardline group in Syria.
Islamic State pressed a separate assault to capture government-held parts of the northeastern city of Hasaka, blowing up a security building and triggering a government appeal for all residents to take up arms. The United Nations said 60,000 people were reported to have fled the attack.
Islamic State’s twin attacks which began on Thursday showed the group returning to the offensive in Syria after two weeks of defeats at the hands of Kurdish-led forces, supported by U.S.-led air strikes. Earlier this week the Kurds advanced to within 50 km (30 miles) of Raqqa city, the group’s de facto capital.
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The Kurdish YPG militia described the attack on Kobani as “a suicide mission” rather than an attempt to capture the town at the Turkish border. It said it fought intermittent gun battles on Friday with Islamic State fighters holed up in three locations.
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