Prominent clerics in Saudi Arabia warned Arab media against publishing horoscopes, which are popular despite a clerical ban.

Many Saudi-owned newspapers based in UK like Asharq al-Awsat and Al-Hayat started publishing horoscopes in recent years. Even fortunetellers are appearing on Saudi-owned television stations based outside Saudi.

A committee of senior Saudi clerics said in a statement to the media, “This is astrology, which is forbidden and is considered as a form of magic. The committee reminds Muslims and journalists in particular that it is their obligation to take advice from God, his Prophet and the clergy”.

The committee also said that all schools of Islamic law should forbid such practices. The clerics said, “Believing that a certain star can be the cause of happiness or misfortune is a superstition from the pre-Islamic age”.

“Many Saudis don’t know their birth date on the Christian calendar so they don’t care about horoscopes, but the new generation is obsessed by them,” the editor of a popular Saudi daily said.

“It’s blatantly un-Islamic, we won’t do it,” he added.