Manama: Two Saudi families are showing extraordinary resilience in coming to terms with their grief and sorrow after losing relatives in an attack inside a Saudi bank.
Two men were killed and two others injured, including one critically, after a Saudi brandishing an automatic machine gun stormed into Al Rajhi Bank in the Jizan Province on Tuesday morning.
The gunman fired shots that killed the two men and eventually surrendered to the police who had laid siege to the bank.
“My brother Abdullah has just come back from pilgrimage, and he went to the bank to greet a friend who worked there,” Anwar Kinani said. “He and his friend worked together in the past in another branch of the bank, but my brother moved to the health sector while his friend remained with the bank. At that fateful moment, my brother was at the bank to see his friend,” he said, quoted by Saudi news site Sabq on Wednesday.
The family heard about Abdullah’s death four hours after it happened.
“Abdullah had left all his ID cards in his car when he went into the bank, so it was difficult to identify him. The police was able to know his name only after we identified the body at the hospital,” Anwar said. “We had never thought that a bank attack can occur in Saudi Arabia. Now, the whole family is deeply affected, especially our parents and his wife. She had tried to contact him on the phone, but she received no answer. We were aware of an incident at a bank in Jizan, but we never thought Abdullah would be there and that he would be a victim,” he said.
Abdullah is survived by his wife and their four-month-old son.
Yahya Shiban, the second victim in the attack, was at the bank to change his ATM card.
“My brother works for the Saudi Arabian Monetary Agency branch in Jizan, and he went to the bank to have a new ATM card, Abdul Samad, his brother, told Saudi daily Okaz.
“He was shot dead by the gunman and we received his body in the evening. My brother was killed by a totally senseless act against innocent people. Such a criminal act is not condoned by any religion or supported by any logic,” he said.
