Muslim pilgrims leave Mecca city at start of haj
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MECCA, Saudi Arabia  - The annual haj pilgrimage began in Mecca on Monday when hundreds of thousands of Muslim pilgrims put on white clothes, packed their bags and left for a tented encampment on the edge of the holy city.
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Hamas Islamists called on Egypt on Saturday to open its shuttered border crossing with the Gaza Strip to let more than 2,000 Palestinians return to their Gaza homes from the annual haj pilgrimage in Mecca.
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Pakistan Times Foreign Correspondent. TONGI (Bangladesh): A three-day mass gathering of Muslims, considered the largest annual Islamic event after the Hajj, began Friday in Bangladesh.
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A delegation of Iraqi political and religious leaders flew out of Baghdad on U.S. military helicopters Tuesday, heading for Najaf in a bid to end a bloody Shi'ite uprising, delegates said.
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MECCA, Saudi Arabia  - Palestinian leaders headed to the Islamic holy city of Mecca on Tuesday for what officials depicted as a last-ditch effort to end factional fighting and a crippling Western embargo.
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Modern technology has changed the way Muslims experience the hajj pilgrimage, a rite required of able-bodied faithful who can afford it at least once in a lifetime. It has also perhaps changed the way they experience being Muslims, as Islamic militants have popularly seized on the Internet as a tool for publicizing their extremist, often violent, version of the religion.
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ARAFAT, Saudi Arabia  - Muslim pilgrims poured on to the plain of Arafat east of Mecca on Tuesday as the sun rose over the rocky hills for the day marking the climax of the annual haj pilgrimage.
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MINA, Saudi Arabia  - Saudi police were on alert on Friday as millions of Muslims were completing one of the last rituals of the annual haj pilgrimage, testing new crowd control arrangements at an accident spot on the haj itinerary.
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Iraqi police ordered all journalists to leave the holy city of Najaf on Sunday, just as a new U.S. offensive against militants hiding out in a revered shrine began.
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Chanting, "Oh Allah I'm here," hundreds of thousands of pilgrims draped in white garments on Tuesday began to take part in rituals symbolizing the life of their 7th century prophet and streaming into the mammoth tent city of Mina.
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MUZDALIFAH, Saudi Arabia  - More than 2 million  Muslim pilgrims began arriving at Muzdalifah on Wednesday  evening ahead of a stoning ritual in this year's haj, which has  been overshadowed by the Asian tsunami disaster.
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Thousands of African pilgrims heading for the annual Muslim pilgrimage, the Hajj in Saudi Arabia, are stranded.
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MENA, Saudi Arabia  - More than 2.5 million  Muslims began a sacred stoning ritual on Thursday, praising new  measures aimed at averting deadly stampedes that have marred  the haj pilgrimage in the past.
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Thousands of Iraqis walk through Najaf to the city's great shrine as a peace deal takes effect.
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: Shia fighters left the holiest shrine in Najaf today and began turning in their weapons, after tens of thousands of pilgrims celebrated a peace agreement that ended a bloody rebellion.
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To the Editor: Each year, approximately 2 million Muslims travel from all over the world to participate in hajj.
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Pilgrims carry out one of the Hajj's final rituals, as a top Saudi cleric warns them to shun militant forms of Islam.