Windsor Islamic Council Chair Maher El-Masri says the Muslim community is appalled by an attack in Bir al-Abd in the northern Sinai Peninsula of Egypt.
Reports indicate close to 30 militants blocked all the exits to the mosque before shooting and tossing grenades at 500 men, women, and children worshiping inside — vehicles in the parking lot were also set ablaze.
El-Masri says the Muslim community is angered by such a brutal and senseless act. He hopes people exercises common sense and realizes acts of terror and hate are not what his religion is about.
"They have the audacity to claim that they're doing what they're doing in the name of my religion, and my community, that especially makes us angry," he says. "Who are you to claim that your acts represent what Islam stands for? What kind of a human, let alone a Muslim, kills humans in a place of worship?"
Sufi Muslims were believed to be in attendance at the mosque, a school of Islam that militants consider heretic.
He says attacking Muslims in the name of Islam demonstrates how militant groups are perverting religion to suit their agendas — a true Muslim condemns violence against any human-being.
"It's just beyond imagination and understanding, this goes to show that every time you think that these extremists and terrorist groups that do these heinous acts in the name of my religion, every time you think they've sunk to their lowest low, they surprise you and come up with a new low," El-Masri says.
Every time an attack like this happens, El-Masri says the Muslim community feels an obligation to up its efforts to show Islam is about building relationships, not destroying them.
"When these acts happen you go back to square-one and that is to try to redefine Islam because these people are trying to define Islam in a very shameful way," says El-Masri. "We have to try to reclaim our religion."
No group has claimed responsibility for the attack — but CTV News reports witnesses claim the attackers flew the flag of the Islamic State — a militant group of extremists.