For people of Madinah the Prophet’s ﷺ Mosque, Masjid An Nabawi, will open on Sunday. This is the first step in a series of steps opening up the Masjid to the public.
Only the expansion areas and the courtyards will be opened and the old section of the Mosque including Riyadh ul Jannah will remain closed. The area to give Salaam to the Prophet ﷺ at his Rawda is also still closed.
Strict rules will be put in place to ensure safety of worshippers, such as no use of carpets and social distancing during prayer. Regularly cleaning will take place at all times and new guidelines will follow shortly.
Masjid Nabawi and Masjid al Haram were closed when the Coronavirus pandemic spread across the world. The Saudi Arabian government took mature steps which earned them respect from around the Muslim world by shutting down the two Holy Mosques saving them from becoming hotspots for infection.
Since then Saudi Arabia has been trying to implement steps to protect pilgrims and working out ways for their safe return. It has trialled sterilisation gates as well as new stronger filters on their air conditioning to ensure maximum air quality.
Masjid an Nabawi opening is a sign that the authorities are gradually testing the safest approach to opening up Umrah and Hajj for the Muslim Ummah. Of course, they would not want and neither would any Muslim want the Haramain opened up before they were completely safe to visit. The last thing any Muslim wants is for it to become a hotspot for infection so far the Saudi Authorities have done everything based on Science and alhamdulillah managed to control virus spread.
Taiyab Raja, co-founder of Hujjaj.co – the Hajj and
It is unclear what this means for Hajj. It is possible Hajj could take place in a reduced way with only locals, or it may be opened up to a select few thousand pilgrims. Whatever steps are taken it is clear that there will be strict rules put in place to try to control the infection.
