A mosque, named after one Mohamed ibn Al-Fadl, son of Al-Abbas, paternal uncle to Prophet Muhammad (PBUH), was re-opened after restorations costing LE9 million ($292,075). The mosque is also known as Sidi Shebl Al-Aswad.
He was sent by Imam Ali bin Abi Talib, who is considered by Shia Muslims to be the first imam, the rightful religious and political successor to the Prophet to what is now known as Menoufia Governorate, south of the Nile Delta, at the head of an army. It was here that he was martyred on the site of the mosque.
The Fatimids (969-1171 AD) build a mausoleum and a mosque next to his Al-Fadl’s grave. Since that time, construction and restoration of the mosque was on-going. This place of worship was rebuilt as a mosque during the reign of Mohamed Ali Pasha (1805-1848). In 1927, the Ministry of Wakfs (religious endowments) rebuilt the mosque, which is considered an important shrine frequented by Sufis from all over the world.
Supreme Council of Antiquities Secretary General Mostafa Waziry told The Egyptian Gazette that the mosque consists of a rectangular area of six porticos that run parallel to the qibla wall.
The porticos are separated by five rows of square pillars. On the northwestern side of the mosque, in front of the main entrance, there is a rectangular shokh-shikha (an elevated polygonal lantern structure in the middle of the roof) that is supported by eight pillars, which one forms part of the shrine.
There is the tomb of Sidi Shebl and his seven sisters inside two compartments surmounted by a shrine dome. The mosque has one minaret in Mamluk style at the northwest corner, and the remains of another minaret in the southeastern corner.
The re-opening coincides with the National Day of Menoufia Governorate on 13 June marking a day of resistance against British occupation in Dinshaway village in 1906.
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