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Millions Of Pilgrims Gather For Prayers At Arafat For Hajj Climax
ARAFAT, Saudi Arabia, March 4 (IslamOnline & News Agencies) - More than two million Muslims prayed for forgiveness Sunday at the site of the Prophet Mohammad's (Peace Be Upon Him) last sermon 14 centuries ago on the plain of Arafat, the climax of the annual hajj pilgrimage.
"Here I am, Allah, answering your call. There is no other God but you. Here I am," the mass chanted in unison as they gathered on the Arafat plain, 20 kilometers (12 miles) from Mecca, for a day of prayer and meditation.
The faithful - the men clad in two-piece seamless white cloth, the women covered except for the hands and face as a symbol of equality - converged on Arafat by bus and on foot from a tent city in Mina, where they spent the night.
Many carried umbrellas to keep off the Gulf sun as temperatures soared to 30 degrees Celsius (86 Fahrenheit) and humidity picked up under a light cloud covering. Thousands of sprinklers sprayed a fine mist to cool off pilgrims, while drinking water and fruit juices were handed out free-of-charge to the slow-moving mass of bodies on the Arafat plain, where cases of exhaustion and fainting are common during the rituals, especially among the elderly and sick.
They assembled for the "standing" on the 70-meter-high (230-foot) Mount of Mercy (Jabal al-Rahma), the summit of the 1,400-year-old journey of faith, spending the entire day praying for mercy in a symbolic enactment of the Final Judgment.
"Oh, may God unify the Islamic nation," said 45-year-old Egyptian Fuad Issat between prayers. His neighbor, Ibrahim Abdullah, 60, a Palestinian from the Gaza Strip, called on God to "put an end to Israel's occupation" of the West Bank and Gaza.
Thousands of unarmed policemen were deployed along the roads leading to Arafat to ensure the safety of the pilgrims from 160 countries.
As part of measures to avoid dangerous bottlenecks, civil defense helicopters hovered overhead to ensure crowd control, while clinics to provide first aid dotted the route. The second day of pilgrimage had begun without any major incident, Saudi authorities reported Sunday.
But the Russian embassy in Riyadh said that police in Mecca had arrested 59 pilgrims from the Russian republic of Dagestan over the past week for trying to sell weapons, including rifles, swords and night-vision goggles, to fellow Muslims.
The group, part of around 2,000 who had traveled overland from Dagestan, were later released "in an act of tolerance" by Saudi authorities to allow them to complete their pilgrimage.
A record 1.5 million pilgrims have poured into Saudi Arabia this year, joining around 500,000 Muslim pilgrims who live in the kingdom, for the hajj, which is one of the five pillars of Islam. Every able-bodied Muslim with the financial means is required to make the hajj at least once in a lifetime.
On Monday, the hajj will start to wind down with the symbolic "Stoning of Satan" ceremony in Mina. The same day, pilgrims will also slaughter a sheep in memory of Abraham's readiness to sacrifice his son Ismail for God before the boy's life was spared, starting Eid al-Adha, the feast of sacrifice celebrated by Muslims the world over.
Saudi authorities have set up a huge abattoir with a workforce of almost 46,000 people, including veterinary surgeons, to oversee the slaughter of around 700,000 sheep, goats, cows and camels during the festival that marks the end of the hajj.
The Islamic Development Bank, affiliated with the Organization of Islamic Conference (OIC), distributes slaughtered cattle to needy Muslims worldwide.
A Gulf-based newspaper, the Kuwait Times, estimated the number of pilgrims at "nearly three million Muslims," and that the oil-rich Kingdom, under the leadership of King Fahd, known as custodian of the Two Holy Mosques, spent billions of dollars to prepare the holy sites.
The paper said Saudi Arabia spent up to 120 billion Saudi riyals ($3 billion) for the expansion of the holy sites to make space for up to 770,000 worshippers. A Saudi textile company made 40,000 tents from fireproof fabric in 1999 for the pilgrims. The project has cost up to 2.9 billion SR.
In 1997, a fire gutted pilgrims' tents in Mina, killing 350 people, injuring 1,600 others and demolishing 70,000 tents - a third of the tents pitched in the region.
Saudi Arabia has built a huge network of roads in Mecca to facilitate the pilgrims' movement, expanded Al-Jamarat bridge in Mina and built many medical clinics, drinking water taps and police stations.
Saudi authorities, in 1984, built the drinking water station Wadi Rehjan, located 50 kilometers from Mecca to secure cold water for visitors.
Around 13,000 buses have been mobilized to transport pilgrims from Mecca to Medina, where thousands of doctors, policemen, cleaners and post workers have been put on alert for the service of the worshippers.
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