After sunset, the throng moved aboard buses to nearby Muzdalifah, in preparation for the first hajj stoning ritual since a deadly stampede during last year’s pilgrimage.
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“It’s handsome to see the Muslims of the world pray together here”.
In one of the deadliest disasters to befall the annual Muslim rite in decades, the crush previous year killed almost 800 pilgrims, according to Riyadh, though counts by countries of repatriated bodies showed that more than 2,000 people may have died, more than 400 of them Iranians.
“I have prayed to God to have mercy on us, give us relief and resolve Syria’s crisis”, said Um Fadi, wearing a traditional long black embroidered dress and head scarf native to her home in southern Syria.
Muslim pilgrims throw pebbles at pillars during the “Jamarat” ritual, the stoning of Satan, in Mina near the holy city of Mecca, on September 12, 2016.
Even in the early hours of Sunday the heat was stifling, forcing pilgrims to shelter under trees or the numerous tarpaulins which have been set up. They will spend the most important day of the hajj in prayer and reading from the Koran. The publication Arab News reports that authorities have conducted 1,000 health and safety training courses in recent weeks and deployed 26,000 medical, technical and other official personnel to pilgrimage areas in Mecca, Medina, Arafat and Mina, along with a fleet of more than 175 ambulances.
The stoning ritual coincides with Eid al-Adha, Islam’s feast of sacrifice, which is celebrated by more than 1.5 billion Muslims worldwide. However, Iran, which had the greatest number of deaths among foreign nationals, has put the death toll at about 4,700.
The pilgrims are performing the ritual, which symbolizes the stoning of the devil, smoothly and without overcrowding inside the Jamarat Bridge, the official Saudi news agency, SPA, reported.
On Sunday helicopters monitored the crowd flow while, on the ground, police on foot, motorbike, and all-terrain vehicles directed pedestrian movement.
From this year pilgrims are given electronic bracelets storing personal and medical information that will help authorities provide care and identify non-Arabic speaking people.
Moreover, Mayor of Urfa Celalettin Güvenç described Saudi Arabia’s organization for this Year’s Hajj as “amazing”, noting that security measures taken to protect this mass of pilgrims were excellent.
The numbers are down this year because of the absence of 64,000 Iranians over tensions between their Shiite nation and the Sunni-dominated kingdom.
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On Saturday evening the authorities in Saudi Arabia revealed official figures, which goes up to 1.3 million pilgrims attending the Hajj from outside Saudi Arabia. This grand, symbolic gesture of Islamic unity seems to be reeling under the effect of politics, in particular the row between the two dominant Islamic states in the Middle East, Saudi Arabia and Iran, which since 2012 appear to be engaged in an undeclared state of regional war.
