Makkah, home of Islam, saw the war on Iraq reflected everywhere, from the prayers for the welfare of the Iraqi people that filled the mosques to record numbers of patients in hospitals suffering from depression.
Through mosques, Qunoot prayers (extra prayers of supplication) are held after each of the five daily prayers, especially Isha (evening) prayers. The suffering of the Iraqi victims of this war is mentioned during Friday sermons. In addition, cell phone messages alerted people to the time when special prayers for the people of Iraq are to be said.
“One message I got said: ‘Search your memory for the old men and women you know and ask them to pray for the Iraqis’ since the prayers of old people find particular acceptance,” said Maryam Abu-Ali, the deputy director of the Arabic Language Institute for Non-native Speakers at Umm Al-Qura University. She also started her classes at the Qur’an memorization school with a prayer for the Iraqi people.
Teachers at the university set aside the first or last 10 minutes of classes to discuss the issue of Iraq with their students. “We would start with a prayer and then discuss Iraqi situation, hoping that people there would find peace,” said a member of the teaching staff in the English Department, at Umm Al-Qura University.
“The first week of Rabea Al-Awwal is the Education Week, and charity events will be held in order to raise money for the reconstruction of Iraq,” said Dr. Jamila Sagga, deputy director for the female student affairs at Umm Al-Qura University. The events include collecting money and the sale of food and home supplies by the International Islamic Relief Organization in Saudi Arabia and some businessmen.
The seminars of the World Assembly of Muslim Youth Organization in Azizyah also ended with a prayer for the Iraqi people. In addition, some private houses in the society of Makkah held weekly get-togethers to discuss religious, social, and cultural matters and close with prayers for all Muslims around the world and especially the Iraqi nation. The leader of The Saudi Red Crescent Organization, Dr. Abdulrahman Al-Suwailim, said the organization sent inspection teams to make sure Saudi contributions, which include food and medical supplies, reached their destination.
The war on Iraq also took a psychological toll in the holy city. “It affected not only just children but adults as well. My grown-up sons are afraid that what happened in Iraq could happen to us,” said Suzan Shams, a member of the teaching staff at the college of social sciences at Umm Al-Qura University.
Psychiatrists confirmed that their clinics were full of new patients suffering from depression, anxiety, and sleeping disorders due to the psychological pressure on account of the situation in Iraq that daily filled their screens, according to Al-Nadwa newspaper. The psychological pressure manifests itself physically too as depression can lead to loss of appetite, frustration, nightmares, mood-swings and nervousness.
Arab News Islam 21 April 2003
