Saudi Hospitality: From Tradition to Serving Hajj and Umrah Pilgrims

Founded by a group of dedicated volunteers and experts, the Association for Pilgrims and Umrah Services focuses on ensuring the safety and comfort of pilgrims at the start of their journey. (Asharq Al-Awsat)
Founded by a group of dedicated volunteers and experts, the Association for Pilgrims and Umrah Services focuses on ensuring the safety and comfort of pilgrims at the start of their journey. (Asharq Al-Awsat)
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Saudi Hospitality: From Tradition to Serving Hajj and Umrah Pilgrims

Founded by a group of dedicated volunteers and experts, the Association for Pilgrims and Umrah Services focuses on ensuring the safety and comfort of pilgrims at the start of their journey. (Asharq Al-Awsat)
Founded by a group of dedicated volunteers and experts, the Association for Pilgrims and Umrah Services focuses on ensuring the safety and comfort of pilgrims at the start of their journey. (Asharq Al-Awsat)

Arabs have a long-standing tradition of hospitality, treating guests with the utmost respect.

This value remains strong in Saudi Arabia, where generosity extends beyond family gatherings and friend visits to include the Hajj pilgrims and Umrah performers. For them, the Kingdom becomes a second home, with open doors and hearts.

In northern Saudi Arabia, near border crossings that welcome travelers from neighboring countries, the Association for Pilgrims and Umrah Services plays a key role.

Founded by a group of dedicated volunteers and experts, the association focuses on ensuring the safety and comfort of pilgrims at the start of their journey.

The association operates at key border points like Jadeedah Arar and Al-Hadithah, the main entry points for pilgrims coming by land from countries such as Iraq, Jordan, Palestine and Syria.

Close by, the association has set up a fully equipped city for pilgrims, offering a field hospital, relaxation areas, food services and guidance to make their spiritual journey easier.

Speaking to Asharq Al-Awsat, Badr Al-Shammari, the chairman of the board of directors of the Association for Pilgrims and Umrah Services in Al-Jawf region, told Asharq Al-Awsat: “We are the first point of contact for pilgrims arriving from the north. Our goal is to provide an exceptional experience, ensuring pilgrims feel safe and comfortable, with all the medical and food services they need.”

The association goes beyond basic services, launching innovative projects to tackle challenges. One key initiative is the mobile workshop for fixing broken buses on the route between border crossings and Madinah. The team is always ready to respond quickly, reducing delays and easing the journey for pilgrims.

From the moment pilgrims arrive at the association's site, the team works with local government agencies to provide continuous care and services around the clock.

If pilgrims face health issues, they are immediately examined at the field hospital. For more serious conditions, they are transferred to nearby public hospitals.

One touching story that highlights the association’s humanitarian work involved an elderly pilgrim who fell ill and was taken to a health center by the association's team.

After receiving initial treatment at the field hospital, he was transferred to a public hospital. Once he recovered, he asked how to pay for the medical services he had received. He was surprised to learn that all services were free, as directed by Custodian of the Two Holy Mosques King Salman bin Abdulaziz.

Moved, the pilgrim told the team: “I never expected such care and services. Everything was organized, and the staff truly cared about my comfort. I pray that God protects this country and its people.”

At a Hajj and Umrah Conference in Jeddah, Al-Shammari explained that the association’s mission goes beyond providing daily services.

“Our work is a noble mission aimed at fully supporting the guests and helping them perform their rituals easily and comfortably. This is a great honor,” he stressed.



Scientists Say Several Thousand Earthquakes Detected Near Greece’s Island of Santorini

 Members of Greece’s military geographical team proceed to conduct measurements to evaluate potential structural changes due to the ongoing seismic activity on the volcanic island of Nea Kameni, Greece February 10, 2025. (Reuters)
Members of Greece’s military geographical team proceed to conduct measurements to evaluate potential structural changes due to the ongoing seismic activity on the volcanic island of Nea Kameni, Greece February 10, 2025. (Reuters)
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Scientists Say Several Thousand Earthquakes Detected Near Greece’s Island of Santorini

 Members of Greece’s military geographical team proceed to conduct measurements to evaluate potential structural changes due to the ongoing seismic activity on the volcanic island of Nea Kameni, Greece February 10, 2025. (Reuters)
Members of Greece’s military geographical team proceed to conduct measurements to evaluate potential structural changes due to the ongoing seismic activity on the volcanic island of Nea Kameni, Greece February 10, 2025. (Reuters)

Scientists have detected several thousand earthquakes, the vast majority of them with small magnitudes, in just over two weeks near Greece's volcanic island of Santorini, the University of Athens' crisis management committee said Tuesday, adding that a larger quake cannot be ruled out.

The highly unusual barrage of earthquakes which began in late January has alarmed authorities. They have declared a state of emergency on Santorini, one of Greece’s most popular tourist destinations, deploying rescue crews with drones and a sniffer dog and putting coast guard and navy vessels on standby.

Thousands of residents and visitors have left the island, while schools on Santorini and nearby islands have been ordered to remain closed for the week.

Extra doctors and paramedics have been sent to Santorini's hospital, while six disaster medicine teams are on standby as reinforcements. Medical staff practiced an evacuation drill Tuesday, running out of the building while wheeling stretchers with people posing as patients.

“The preparation of our health facilities for natural disasters such as earthquakes is of vital importance,” Deputy Health Minister Marios Themistokleous said while visiting the hospital.

Scientists have been closely monitoring the earthquake swarm occurring between the islands of Santorini and Amorgos, and the two volcanoes in the area. They say it’s unclear whether the dozens of quakes each day – ranging from magnitude 3 to roughly 5 or just above – are a precursor to a significantly larger, main earthquake or will continue with frequent lower magnitude quakes for several weeks or months.

Overall, about 12,000 earthquakes with magnitudes greater than 1 have been registered since Jan. 26, with 109 occurring on Monday alone, the National and Kapodistrian University of Athens' crisis management committee said in a statement Tuesday.

Thirteen of Monday's quakes registered magnitudes greater than 4, while several more with similar magnitudes struck on Tuesday. The largest so far, with a magnitude 5.2, struck on Monday night and was followed about two hours later by another with magnitude 5.

“The possibility of a main earthquake following cannot be ruled out,” the statement said.

Scientists were deploying more surveying equipment in the area Tuesday to monitor the situation, the University of Athens said, while seismologists and volcanologists were to meet with government officials Tuesday evening as part of regular discussions of the situation.

Although Greece lies in a highly seismically active part of the world and earthquakes are frequent, it is very rare for any part of the country to experience such an intense barrage of earthquakes for such an extended period of time.

Santorini took its present crescent shape following a massive volcanic eruption in antiquity — one of the largest known eruptions in human history. Now, millions of visitors each year see its dramatic scenery of whitewashed houses and blue-domed churches clinging to the rim of the caldera, the flooded crater left behind by a volcano that erupted and then collapsed.