Transportation Facilities Of Mecca

Transportation Facilities Of Mecca/madina/saudiarabia/ksa

Transportation facilities related to the Hajj or Umrah are the main services available. Mecca has only the small Mecca East Airport with no airline service, so most pilgrims access the city through the Hajj terminal of King Abdulaziz International Airport or the Jeddah Seaport, both of which are in Jeddah.

The city lacks any public transportation options for residents and visitors alike, both during and outside of the pilgrimage season. The main transportation options available for travel within and around the city are either personal vehicles or private taxis.

A 20 km (12 mi) metro system is under construction and is scheduled for completion in 2011. A total of 5 metro lines are planned to carry pilgrims to the religious sites.

Religious Significance Of Mecca

Religious Significance Of Mecca,Saudi Arabian,medina

The vast majority of Meccans are Sunni Muslims, with a minority of Shiite Pilgrims.The Kaaba is the site for many Islamic religious activities.

The Koran instructs Muslims to face Mecca during daily prayer. Initially the direction (Qibla) of daily prayer was toward the Al-Aqsa Mosque in Jerusalem but Muhammad adopted the Kaaba as a physical focus for the Muslim community and so the direction of prayer has been thus from the 7th century until the present day. The Qibla gave rise to a field of study in medieval Islam, distinct and separate from mainstream Islamic tradition of mathematical geography and cartography.

The religious environment of Mecca is influenced strongly by the Wahhabi and Shafi`i schools as well as the wider conflict between liberals and religious scholars.

Relation With Mecca And Muhammad

Relation With Mecca/makkah/mokkah And Muhammad/Mohammad

Muhammad was born in Mecca in 570, and thus Islam has been inextricably linked with Mecca ever since. Muhammad was born in a minor faction, the Hashemites, of the ruling Quraysh tribe. Islamic tradition states that he began receiving divine revelations there in 610 AD, and began to preach monotheism against Meccan animism. After enduring persecution for 13 years, Muhammad emigrated (see Hijra) in 622 with his followers to Yathrib (later called Medina)The conflict between the Quraysh and the Muslims, however, continued: the two fought in the Battle of Badr, where Muslims defeated the Quraysh outside Medina; whilst the Meccans overcame the Muslims at the Battle of Uhud. Overall, however, Meccan efforts to annihilate Islam were unsuccessful, and during the Battle of the Trench in 627, the combined armies of Arabia were unable to defeat Muhammad.
The Ottoman Empire, including Mecca

In 628, Muhammad and his followers peacefully marched to Mecca, attempting to enter the city for pilgrimage. Instead, however, both Muslims and Meccans entered into the Treaty of Hudaybiyyah, whereby Muslims and Quraysh would cease fighting and Muslims would be allowed into the city the following year. Two years later the Quraysh violated the truce, but instead of continuing their fight, the city of Mecca shortly surrendered to Muhammad, who declared amnesty for the inhabitants and gave generous gifts to the leading Quraysh. The ancient tribal religious art, including that in the Kabaah, was destroyed or defaced by Muhammad's army and is now lost to history. Muhammad declared Mecca as the holiest site in Islam ordaining it as the center of Muslim pilgrimage, one of the faith's five pillars. Muhammad returned to Medina, leaving behind Akib ibn Usaid to govern the city. Muhammad's other activities in Arabia led to the unification of the peninsula, putting an end to the wars that had disrupted life in the city for so long.

Muhammad died in 632, but with the sense of unity that he had passed on to the Arabians, Islam began a rapid expansion, and within the next few hundred years stretched from North Africa well into Asia. As the Islamic Empire grew, Mecca continued to attract pilgrims not just from Arabia, but now from all across the Empire, as Muslims sought to perform the annual Hajj.

Mecca also attracted a year-round population of scholars, pious Muslims who wished to live close to the Kaaba, and local inhabitants who served the pilgrims. Due to the difficulty and expense of the Hajj, pilgrims arrived by boat at Jeddah, and came overland, or joined the annual caravans from Syria or Iraq.

Details History About Mecca

Details History About Mecca/makkah/makka/mokka
Mecca: One Of the holiest city,place of the Saudi Arabia[ksa] and world.

Mecca , sometimes spelled Makkah , is the holiest meeting site of the Islamic religion. The city is modern, cosmopolitan and whilst being closed to non-muslims is nonetheless ethnically diverse.

Islamic tradition attributes the beginning of Mecca to Ishmael's descendants. In the 7th century, the Islamic prophet Muhammad proclaimed Islam in the city which was by then an important trading center. After 966, Mecca was led by local sharifs, until 1924, when it came under the rule of the Saudis. In its modern period Mecca has seen a great expansion in size and infrastructure.

The modern day city is the capital of Saudi Arabia's Mecca Province, in the historic Hejaz region. With a population of 1.7 million (2008), the city is located 73 km (45 mi) inland from Jeddah in a narrow valley at a height of 277 m (910 ft) above sea level.

Early History : According to Islamic tradition, the history of Mecca goes back to Abraham who built the Kaaba with the help of his son Ishmael in around 2000 BC when the inhabitants of Mecca had fallen away from monotheism through the influence of the Amelkites.[16] The Kaaba was used as a repository for the idols and tribal gods of Arabia's nomadic tribes. Mecca's most important god was Hubal, placed there by the ruling Quraysh tribe[17][18] and remaining until the 7th century AD.

Ptolemy may have called the city "Macoraba", though this identification is controversial.[19] In the 5th century, the Quraysh took control of Mecca, and became skilled merchants and traders. In the 6th century they joined the lucrative spice trade as well, since battles in other parts of the world were causing trade routes to divert from the dangerous sea routes to the relatively more secure overland routes. The Byzantine Empire had previously controlled the Red Sea, but piracy had been on the increase. Another previous route, that from the Persian Gulf via the Tigris and Euphrates rivers, was also being threatened by exploitation from the Sassanid Empire, as well as being disrupted by the Lakhmids, the Ghassanids, and the Roman–Persian Wars. Mecca's prominence as a trading center surpassed the cities of Petra and Palmyra.

By the middle of the 6th century, there were three major settlements in northern Arabia, all along the south-western coast that borders the Red Sea, in a habitable region between the sea and the great desert to the east. This area, known as the Hejaz, featured three settlements grown around oases, where water was available. In the center of the Hejaz was Yathrib, later renamed Medina. 250 mi (400 km) south of Yathrib was the mountain city Ta’if, north-west of which lay Mecca. Although the area around Mecca was completely barren, Mecca was the wealthiest of the three settlements with abundant water via the Zamzam Well and a position at the crossroads of major caravan routes.

The harsh conditions of the Arabian peninsula meant a near-constant state of conflict between the local tribes, but once a year they would declare a truce and converge upon Mecca in an annual pilgrimage. This journey was intended for religious reasons, to pay homage to the shrine, and to drink from the Zamzam Well. However, it was also the time each year that disputes would be arbitrated, debts would be resolved, and trading would occur at Meccan fairs. These annual events gave the tribes a sense of common identity and made Mecca an important focus for the peninsula.

Camel caravans, said by Muslims to have first been used by Muhammad's great-grandfather, were a major part of Mecca's economy. Alliances were struck between the merchants in Mecca and the local nomadic tribes, who would bring goods - leather, livestock, and metals mined in the local mountains - to Mecca to be loaded on the caravans and carried to cities in Syria and Iraq. Islamic tradition claims that goods from other continents also flowed through Mecca. Supposedly goods from Africa and the Far East passed through on route to Syria including spices, leather, medicine, cloth, and slaves; in return Mecca received money, weapons, cereals and wine, which in turn were distributed throughout Arabia. The Meccans signed treaties with both the Byzantines and the Bedouins, and negotiated safe passage for caravans giving them water and pasture rights. Mecca became the center of a loose confederation of client tribes, including the tribes of the Banu Tamim. Other regional powers such as the Abyssinian, Ghassan, and Lakhm were in decline leaving Meccan trade to be the primary binding force in Arabia in the late 6th century.

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Economy Business Of Saudi Arabian

Saudi Arabia's economy is petroleum-based; roughly 75% of budget revenues and 90% of export earnings come from the oil industry. The oil industry comprises about 45% of Saudi Arabia's gross domestic product, compared with 40% from the private sector (see below). Saudi Arabia officially has about 260 billion barrels (4.1×1010 m3) of oil reserves, comprising about 24% of the world's proven total petroleum reserves.

The government is attempting to promote growth in the private sector by privatizing industries such as power and telecom. Saudi Arabia announced plans to begin privatizing the electricity companies in 1999, which followed the ongoing privatization of the telecommunications company. Shortages of water and rapid population growth may constrain government efforts to increase self-sufficiency in agricultural products.

In the 1990s, Saudi Arabia experienced a significant contraction of oil revenues combined with a high rate of population growth. Per capita income fell from a high of $11,700 at the height of the oil boom in 1981 to $6,300 in 1998.[24] Recent[when?] oil price increases have helped boost per capita GDP to $17,000 in 2007 dollars, or about $7,400 adjusted for inflation.

Recent oil price increases have triggered a second oil boom, pushing Saudi Arabia's budget surplus to $28 billion (110SR billion) in 2005. Tadawul (the Saudi stock market index) finished 2004 with a massive 76.23% to close at 4437.58 points. Market capitalization was up 110.14% from a year earlier to stand at $157.3 billion (589.93SR billion), which makes it the biggest stock market in the Middle East.‏

OPEC (the Organization of Oil Exporting Countries) limits its members' oil production based on their "proven reserves." The higher their reserves, the more OPEC allows them to produce.[citation needed] Saudi Arabia's published reserves have shown little change since 1980, with the main exception being an increase of about 100 billion barrels (1.6×1010 m3) between 1987 and 1988.Matthew Simmons has suggested that Saudi Arabia is greatly exaggerating its reserves and may soon show production declines (see peak oil). To diversify the economy, Saudi Arabia launched a new city on the western coast with investments exceeding $26.6 billion. The city, which is named "King Abdullah Economic City", will be built near al-Rabegh industrial city north to Jeddah. The new city, where construction work started in December 2005, includes a port which is the largest port of the kingdom. Extending along a coastline of 35 km, the city will also include petrochemical, pharmaceutical, tourism, finance and education and research areas. Saudi Arabia officially became a World Trade Organization member in December 2005.