Umrah agents cash in on Ramadan

July 1, 2014

Umrah agent
Riyadh, Jul 1: Travel operators in Riyadh will increase the prices of weekend Umrah packages from SR90 per head to SR160 from Wednesday thanks to the influx of pilgrims during Ramadan.

Demand is expected to be heavy until the end of the Ramadan season.

This year, the peak season coincides with the summer holidays. As such, a large number of vacationers, including Saudis, are expected to perform Umrah.

A leading hotelier in Makkah said that foreign pilgrims are less compared to last year thanks to factors such as the World Cup and the MERS.

“The majority of pilgrims come from the Kingdom, as well as from the Gulf countries,” he said. “Other pilgrims come from countries such as Egypt, Turkey, Algeria, India, Pakistan, Sri Lanka, Malaysia and Indonesia.”

Accommodation at five-star hotels skyrockets to anywhere between SR31,000 to SR40,000 for a 10-day period near the end of Ramadan.

There are nearly 275 Umrah travel operators spread out in the capital, but their largest concentration is located in the city center in Batha.

Riyadh’s Dawah Center has arranged 45 coaches to ferry Umrah pilgrims from the capital free-of-charge.

Moulavi Ramzan from the center told Arab News that program beneficiaries are mainly singles from Asian and Arab countries.

Accommodation, transport and iftar will be given to the pilgrims, he said.

A return fare from Riyadh to Makkah by luxury coach, including accommodation in Makkah, will cost SR160 per pilgrim. An additional charge of SR20 will be incurred if the pilgrim opts to visit the Prophet’s Mosque in Madinah en route to Makkah.

Accommodation can be upgraded to four-star standards for a mere SR100.

According to a sales executive from Al-Rushd, a travel operator in the city, the trip to Makkah and Madinah sets out at 4 p.m. from Riyadh on Wednesday and ends on Friday at midnight.

Each family is given a large room, while bachelors are accommodated on a sharing basis, with three pilgrims per room. Children under 12 have to pay half the fare. “We will provide three-star hotel accommodation for our customers,” he said.

Another travel agent said a five-day package to Makkah and Madinah, including travel and accommodation, will cost a pilgrim only SR250.

The offer includes a two-day stay at a three-star hotel in Madinah and another two-day lodging at a similar hotel in Makkah. The journey begins on Monday and ends on Friday.

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News Network
November 15,2024

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Iran’s Islamic Revolution Guards Corps (IRGC) has killed or captured 69 terrorists linked to the Israeli spy agency Mossad during a major counterterrorism drill in the country's southeast, its spokesman says.  

General Ahmad Shafaei, the spokesman for the “Martyrs of Security” drill, said Friday that a total of 23 terrorists have been killed and another 46 arrested in various clean-up operations ever since the IRGC Ground Force launched it in the Sistan and Baluchestan province on November 1.

Seven terrorists have also turned themselves in during the period.

“The undeniable fact about terrorists is that they rely on arrogant powers, particularly the intelligence service of the wicked and vicious Zionist regime," Shafaei said.

“Unfortunately, weapons and munitions at terrorists’ disposal are among the most sophisticated ones in the world. This accounts for their heavy dependence.” 

The official stated that several members of the disbanded terror teams were non-Iranian nationals, who had been hired by foreign intelligence agencies to carry out acts of sabotage and terror inside Iran.

In a most recent operation, six terrorists were arrested and four others were eliminated, three of whom were non-Iranians, he added. 

On October 26, ten members of Iran's law enforcement forces were killed in a terrorist attack in the Gohar Kuh district of Taftan in the Sistan and Baluchestan province.

The so-called Jaish al-Adl terrorist group claimed responsibility for the assault, which was one of the deadliest in the province in recent months.

The group has carried out numerous terrorist attacks in Iran, primarily in Sistan and Baluchestan.

Its tactics include the abduction of border guards as well as targeting civilians and police stations within the province to incite chaos and disorder.

In January, Iran launched a military operation during which the headquarters of the Pakistan-based terrorist group was targeted in missile strikes, destroying its infrastructure.

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News Network
November 27,2024

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Gaza health authorities say Israel’s military has "erased” over 1,400 Palestinian families in the besieged territory over the past year.

The Health Ministry said in a statement on Tuesday that the Israeli regime "completely erased about 1,410 families, numbering 5,444 people, from the civil registry during the same period.”

It said that there were 3,463 families with only one survivor, while 2,287 families had more than one survivor.

In northern Gaza, Israel’s warplanes have continued dropping bombs over Palestinian families, Palestinian news agency Wafa reported.

It said one airstrike hit a family home in Jabalia, causing numerous casualties on Tuesday.

According to Gaza's civil defense agency, at least seven people were killed and several others wounded in the attack.

Another person was killed in a strike on a house in nearby Beit Lahia, a town in northern Gaza, which has been declared “a disaster area" by the municipality due to "the Israeli war of extermination and siege, and it has no food, water, hospitals, doctors, services, or communications."

The health ministry said, “Israeli forces killed 14 people and injured 108 others in three massacres of families in the last 24 hours.”

“Many people are still trapped under the rubble and on the roads as rescuers are unable to reach them.”

International organizations and leaders believe that Israel’s genocidal war, now in its second year, is a deliberate attempt to destroy the population of Gaza.

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News Network
November 26,2024

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The extremist Israeli finance minister has called for the occupation of the Gaza Strip and halving the population of the Palestinian territory that is reeling from almost 14 months of genocide.  

Bezalel Smotrich, who has a history of racist statements against Palestinians, made the controversial remarks during a conference of the Yesha Council settler group on Monday.

“We can occupy Gaza and thin the population by half within two years,” through encouraging the so-called “voluntary emigration," he said.

The racist minister also urged the Tel Aviv regime to use its favorable ties with the incoming administration of US President-elect Donald Trump to implement the plan.

“Occupying Gaza is not a dirty word,” he further claimed.

Once the success of the “voluntary emigration" is proven in the besieged Gaza Strip, it can be replicated in the occupied West Bank, he added.

Last month, Smotrich urged the full annexation of the West Bank and Gaza, asserting that Israel should unequivocally declare there would be no Palestinian state.

Israel launched its brutal Gaza onslaught on October 7, 2023, after the Palestinian Hamas resistance group carried out a historic operation against the usurping entity in retaliation for its intensified atrocities against the Palestinian people.

However, nearly 14 months into the offensive, the Tel Aviv regime has failed to achieve its declared objectives of finding captives held in Gaza and eliminating Hamas.

So far, the occupying regime has killed at least 44,235 Palestinians, mostly women and children, and injured 104,638 others, in Gaza. 

It has been committing the war crimes of starvation and of intentionally directing attacks against the civilian population in the besieged territory.

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