BAGHDAD, July 9. (DPA/EP) –
Hundreds of Muslims have prayed for Eid al Adha in the emblematic Al Nuri Mosque in Mosul five years after it was blown up by the militants of the Islamic State jihadist group.
The Umayyad temple, dating from the 12th century, was the scene of the proclamation of the Caliphate of the Islamic State in 2014, in an act starring Abu Bakr al Baghdadi.
However, it was destroyed three years later by the Islamic State itself before the advance of the Iraqi government forces that finally put an end to the territorial domination and to the Caliphate itself in the following months.
The building is being rebuilt, including its renowned minaret, the Al Hadba or ‘Hunchback’, which also succumbed to the jihadist group’s explosives.
This Sunday marks exactly five years since the official declaration by the Iraqi government of the liberation of Mosul from the jihadist militias.
