Six persons including four security personnels were killed,many hurt in suicidal attack near Masjid-i-Nabvi (PBUH)

A suicide bomber detonated a device near the security headquarters of Masjid-i-Nabvi (PBUH) in Madinah, the second-holiest site in Islam, Saudi-owned al-Arabiya television reported on Monday.

The news channel showed images of fire raging in a parking lot and reported the initial death toll in Madinah as five, which includes the suicide bomber and four security officers.

—AFP

Security forces cordoned off the area following the attack. Al Arabiya’s correspondent said worshipers were unhurt following the attack.

The sprawling mosque where the Prophet Muhammad (PBUH) is buried is visited by millions of Muslims from around the world each year during pilgrimages to Makkah.

A video sent by a witness to the aftermath of the Madinah bombing showed a large blaze among parked cars in the fading evening light, with a sound of sirens in the background.

Two blasts outside Shia mosque in Qatif

Earlier, In Qatif, an eastern city that is home to many members of the Shia minority, at least one and possibly two explosions struck near a Shia mosque.

Witnesses described body parts, apparently of a suicide bomber, in the aftermath.

A resident of the city reached by telephone said there were believed to be no casualties there apart from the attacker, as worshippers had already gone home to break their fasts. Civil defence forces were cleaning up the area and police were investigating, the resident said.

“Suicide bomber for sure. I can see the body” which was blasted to pieces, said a witness.

Foreign bomber strikes near US consulate in Jeddah

A foreign suicide bomber blew himself up near the American consulate in Saudi Arabia's western city of Jeddah in the early hours of US Independence Day on Monday.

The Saudi interior ministry said the bomber was a Pakistani citizen residing in the kingdom.Two security officers were slightly wounded, the ministry said.

The American embassy in Riyadh reported no injuries among US consulate staff.

General Mansour al-Turki, the interior ministry spokesman, told Saudi-owned Al-Arabiya television that the bomber was not Saudi but a “resident foreigner”.All the three incidents of explosions — targeting US diplomats, Shia worshippers and the security headquarters of Masjid-i-Nabvi (PBUH) — follow days of mass killings claimed by the Islamic State group, in Turkey, Bangladesh and Iraq.