Saudia to carry 818,000 Haj pilgrims

September 17, 2014

Jeddah, Sep 17: Saudi Arabian Airlines (Saudia) will carry nearly 818,000 pilgrims coming for Haj this year from different parts of the world, said Saleh bin Nasser Al-Jasser, director general of the Kingdom’s flag carrier.

Saudia will carry 785,984 pilgrims from 72 international airports including 470,770 from Asia, 118,951 from the Middle East and Gulf, 105,462 from Europe and America, 90,801 from Africa in addition to 32,000 from Saudi cities.

“We have opened four new markets this year: Sudan, Sweden, Denmark and Norway,” Al-Jasser said. The first Saudia flight carrying Haj pilgrims arrived from the Bangladesh capital, Dhaka.

“We’ll transport pilgrims from all over the world to King Abdulaziz International Airport in Jeddah and Prince Mohammed International Airport in Madinah,” he said, adding that Saudia would carry 145,000 pilgrims to Madinah airport.

He said Saudia would make use of its newly purchased fleet to transport the pilgrims. “We have also rented 29 aircraft with 11,600 seats to meet the growing demand during the Haj season,” he said.

Saudia has deployed an adequate number of employees at all stations to meet the requirements of the Haj traffic. “We have also appointed employees from Indonesia, Malaysia, India and Bangladesh at the Jeddah and Madinah airports to meet passengers’ needs,” Al-Jasser said.

The airline has made arrangements for transporting Zamzam water cans for pilgrims on returning empty flights to India, Indonesia and Malaysia. It has also signed contracts with hotels to accommodate stranded pilgrims.

“We have set out an alternative plan, depending on the sighting of the new moon,” he explained.

Spelling out the airline’s special services, he said it includes the distribution of boarding passes in advance at ports of embarkation for return journeys.

“This will give pilgrims peace of mind and enable them to concentrate on prayers and worship instead of visiting the airline’s offices to make bookings and get boarding passes,” he added.

Saudia has also made arrangements for the distribution of meals that suit the taste of pilgrims from different countries on its Haj flights. “We have appointed airhostesses who can speak the language of the pilgrims,” Al-Jasser said.

The airline will also screen Haj-related documentaries during the journey. Pilgrims from Indonesia and Malaysia are given city baggage check-in services in Jeddah while Indian and Iranian pilgrims are given similar services in Makkah.

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UN condemns Israeli regime’s ‘organized torture’ against Palestinians

News Network

November 30,2025

The United Nations Committee against Torture (CAT) has condemned the Israeli regime for enforcing a policy of “organized torture” against Palestinians.

In a report published on Friday, CAT stated that the occupying regime enforces a deliberate policy of “organized and widespread torture and ill-treatment” against Palestinian abductees, particularly since October 7, 2023, when Israel launched its genocidal war on Gaza.

The committee expressed “deep concern over repeated severe beatings, dog attacks, electrocution, water-boarding, use of prolonged stress positions [and] sexual violence” inflicted on Palestinians.

Palestinian prisoners were degraded by “being made to act like animals or being urinated on,” systematically denied medical care, and subjected to excessive restraints, “in some cases resulting in amputation,” the report added.

CAT also condemned the routine application of “unlawful combatants law” to justify the prolonged detention without trial of thousands of Palestinian men, women, and children.

More than 10,000 Palestinians, including women and children, are currently held in Israeli prisons, according to Palestinian and international human rights groups, with 3,474 Palestinians in “administrative detention,” meaning they are imprisoned without trial for indefinite periods.

The report highlighted the “high proportion of children who are currently detained without charge or on remand,” noting that while Israel sets the age of criminal responsibility at 12, even younger children have been abducted.

Children designated as security prisoners face severe restrictions on family contact, may be subjected to solitary confinement, and are denied access to education, in clear violation of international law.

The committee further suggested that Israel’s policies across the Occupied Territories constitute collective torture against the Palestinian population.

“A range of policies adopted by Israel in the course of its continued unlawful presence in the Occupied Palestinian Territory amounts to cruel, inhuman or degrading living conditions for the Palestinian population,” the report said.

On Thursday, the Palestinian resistance movement Hamas condemned the systematic killing and torture of Palestinian abductees in Israeli prisons, urging international action to halt these abuses.

Citing human rights data, Hamas stated that 94 Palestinians have been killed in Israeli prisons since the start of Tel Aviv’s genocidal war on Gaza.

“This reflects an organized criminal approach that has turned these prisons into direct killing grounds to eliminate our people,” the resistance movement said.

Hamas called on the international community, the UN, and human rights organizations to immediately pressure Israel to end crimes against prisoners and uphold their rights as guaranteed by all international conventions and norms.

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