Moroccan Salafist Leaders Claim COVID-19 Is "Divine Punishment"

While some explain the epidemic by resorting to the theory of the American conspiracy, the Moroccan Salafists explain it by the "divine will". Omar Haddouchi, one of the figures of the Salafist movement in Morocco, said that "the disease has affected China and spread from one country to another, despite its technological progress". He added: "I do not want to accuse America or China of spreading it because it kills the elderly, because these are just words for consumption", arguing that the virus is "a soldier among the soldiers of Allah".

He will go further by declaring on his YouTube channel that "what has happened is caused by a sin and can only be eliminated by repentance". "It is a message from God to these people because they do not believe in God," he said, stressing that "the virus has put the great countries to the test despite their technological development". For his part, the Salafist Hassan Kettani describes as "frightening" the suspension of the Umrah by the Saudi authorities.

But against the religious flights of the Salafists, some oppose reason. This is the case of Mohcen Benzakour, a researcher in social psychology, who declared to Hespress that "the religious interpretation of this issue is absolutely not justified, because the Islamic faith itself obliges the human being to seek the causes of these natural phenomena through the power of reason".

He also stressed that some people take advantage of the situation to "develop erroneous religious discourses based on exaggeration". He believes that "the danger of these interpretations lies in the fact that they encourage resignation, and instill fear in people’s minds." He urges the population to turn away from these fatalistic discourses, and to "stick to the medical truth that the animal virus is now spreading between humans".