JEDDAH: Heavy rains and floods have damaged about 35 mosques in Jeddah, but some of them have already been cleaned up and refurnished to receive worshippers, Fehaid Al-Bargi, director of the Endowments and Mosques Administration, told Okaz/Saudi Gazette. Al-Bargi, who accompanied Bakr Mir, Director General of Islamic Affairs, Endowments, Call and Guidance in Makkah Region, on a tour of the damaged mosques, said all of them would be repaired within two days. Worshippers near the damaged mosques went to neighboring districts to perform Friday prayers or performed the prayers in their homes, Al-Bargi said. In a related development, students, teachers and supervisors in the Qur'an memorization circles of the Charitable Society for Memorization of the Holy Qur'an in Jeddah have joined volunteers cleaning up schools and mosques and repairing the damage they suffered. Their efforts are in cooperation with the Endowments and Mosques Administration in Jeddah. Engineer Abdul Aziz Bin Abdullah Hanafi, chairman of the Society, said it issued directives to memorization centers, which have experience from the Jeddah flood disaster in 2009, to provide support and assistance from the very start, in cooperation with the Civil Defense, ambulances, Red Crescent and emergency teams. The Charitable Warehouse in Jeddah also formed volunteer committees to clean up and sterilize the damaged mosques. Faisal Al-Humaid, director of the Warehouse, told Okaz/Saudi Gazette that there are 15 damaged mosques that cannot be used in the districts of Western Baghdadiah, Al-Nakheel and Al-Tawfiq. He added that volunteers have been able to clean up and prepare the mosques since dawn on Friday in Umm Al-Khair Planned District, pointing out that maintenance and cleaning efforts are continuing for the remaining mosques. The Charitable Warehouse in Jeddah distributed 2,350 meals and about 14,000 bottles of drinking water to the flood-affected people in Jeddah's King Abdul Aziz International Airport, he added. Al-Humaid confirmed that since the beginning of the downpours, it started receiving volunteers through its centers in eastern, southern, northern and central Jeddah and Al-Sahefa District center.
