Pre-dawn shooting fires multiple rounds into Pike County Islamic Center during Ramadan

Multiple rounds struck the Pike County Islamic Center in Matamoras during the predawn hours of Feb. 22, 2026, law-enforcement and community accounts say, sending bullets through walls, doors and chandeliers while the mosque was empty and worshippers were not injured.

Pike County officials issued a formal condemnation and identified investigators working the case. “We, the Pike County Board of Commissioners, unequivocally condemn the shooting that occurred on the morning of Sunday, February 22 at the Pike County Islamic Center in Matamoras, PA, during the holy month of Ramadan; and we express our unwavering support of religious freedom, the right to which is bestowed in the First Amendment of the Constitution of the United States.” The county page added that “The Eastern Pike Regional Police Department is actively investigating the incident as a hate crime involving shots fired into the mosque.”

Eastern Pike Regional Police Department has asked the public to share tips and evidence. “The department requests any information related to this incident be shared by emailing cadams@eprpd.org or calling 570-491-4040,” the county statement said.

A congregation member who posted about the incident identified himself as Mohammed Alhomsi and said he had attended taraweeh prayers at the mosque hours earlier with his wife and his 8-year-old daughter. Alhomsi wrote on Facebook, “By the grace of God no one was hurt.” He also described the damage: “Powerful shots were fired, which penetrated through the walls, doors, chandeliers, side doors, front doors,” according to the Religion News Service summary of his post.

The Pike County Islamic Center sits in Matamoras near the Delaware Water Gap east of Scranton, per mapping referenced in news reports, and local accounts say the building was empty at the time of the attack. Religion News Service noted images and social posts have circulated but the immediate public reporting includes no hospital transports or injuries.

National civil-rights groups placed the attack in a broader pattern of threats to Islamic institutions. CAIR identified 40 incidents “explicitly targeting Islamic institutions, including mosques” in 2024, and Religion News Service reported that CAIR’s list did not include any incidents in 2024 where shots were fired directly at a mosque. Edward Ahmed Mitchell, national deputy director for the Council on American-Islamic Relations, said: “No one will be surprised if those attacks turn out to be incidents of anti-Muslim hate,” and “We have to see what the police investigations finds, but the fact that no one would be surprised by it is a sign of the fact that anti-Muslim bigotry is out of control.”

Some social posts circulated a conflicting timeline; an incomplete Instagram snippet read in part: “… County Islamic Center in Matamoras is now being investigated as a bias crime. Multiple shots were fired Saturday night at the mosque during” — but county officials and the mosque-linked postings indicate the incident occurred pre-dawn Sunday, Feb. 22.

Investigators have not announced arrests in the case in the public excerpts released so far. Eastern Pike Regional Police Department and the Pike County Board of Commissioners are asking anyone with information to email cadams@eprpd.org or call 570-491-4040 as the probe continues.