Online articles and websites on the Heritage of Islam |
| What makes this demolition worse is the fact that the home of the Prophet is to make way for a parking lot, two 50-storey hotel towers and seven 35-storey apartment blocks; a project known as the Jabal Omar Scheme, all within a stone's throw of the Grand Mosque. |
| Destruction of the most precious sites in Islam for fear of idolatry by some, is akin to killing a child for fear that he may grow up to be less than pious. Instead of fearing, the idolatry of the historic structures, they could be used as instructional tools for the upcoming generations. |
| In the 1920s, the Saudis levelled the graveyard in Madina that contained the graves of the family and companions of the Prophet. A few years ago, they demolished an old Ottoman fort in Makkah, in spite of the protests of the Turkish government. This disrespect for ancient monuments is a hallmark of Wahabi thought, but one would have thought the Prophet’s home would have been exempt. Clearly, the interests of property developers outweigh religious or historical considerations. |
Readers who have been to Makkah and Madinah on hajj or umrah recently will know how utterly history-less these two cities seem because of the campaign to destroy everything old and replace it with tall buildings, hotels and malls. Particularly, there is a campaign to destroy anything of Islamic historical value.
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