News - Middle East: The annual Hajj pilgrimage started on Monday morning with around two million pilgrims from across the world converging in Saudi Arabia, home to Islam's two holiest sites, for the greatest spiritual experience.

Men draped in traditional white cotton garments and women in loose over-garments (abayas) started marching toward the holy Kaaba reciting “Labbaik Allahumma Labbaik” (Oh God, here I am answering your call), cutting across all barriers of caste, color, and creed.
After spending the previous night in the Mina Valley, pilgrims on Tuesday morning started preparations for one of the most important Hajj rituals - the march toward Mount Arafat.
On Tuesday, the Leader of the Islamic Revolution Ayatollah Seyyed Ali Khamenei issued his annual Hajj message, like every year, drawing attention to the most significant issues facing the Muslim world.
Here are the key points raised in the Leader’s Hajj message this year:
Kaaba – Focal point of Muslims
The Kaaba, a cubical structure draped in black and situated at the center of Masjid al-Haram in the holy city of Mecca, is the “focal point and the main focus of attention of all Muslims.”
The annual Hajj pilgrimage and the rituals associated with it are a demonstration of the “extensive diversity of the Islamic world” which “can serve to elevate human society and improve the health and security of all people.”
The annual Hajj pilgrimage, which draws millions of Muslims from across the world, “can bless all humanity with spiritual and moral elevation” which is a “vital need of humankind today.”
Hajj – Weapon against arrogant powers
The annual pilgrimage of Hajj can “eliminate and render ineffectual all plots of arrogant powers and Zionism” which are essentially designed to trigger the “moral degradation of humanity – today and in the future.”
The necessary condition to ensure the universal impact of this magnificent annual pilgrimage is that Muslims “should properly listen to the life-giving message of Hajj and do their utmost to implement it.”
Hajj message – Intellectual and practical unity
The two main foundations of this enlightening Hajj message pertain to "unity" and "spirituality."
Unity and spirituality as the two ideals guarantee the “material and spiritual advancement of the Islamic world” and enlighten the rest of the world.
Unity, in its essence, means “being connected both intellectually and practically”, which in turn implies that “hearts, thoughts, and orientations come closer together.”
Being united also means "a synergy in science and experience”, “having an economic connection between Islamic countries”, “the existence of trust and cooperation between Muslim governments”, and “working together against common, definite enemies.”
Hajj message – Defeating divisive plots
Unity also implies that “plots designed by the enemy cannot set Islamic denominations, nations, races, languages, and the diverse cultures of the Islamic world against each other.”
It also means that Muslim nations “should know each other, not through the enemy's seditious descriptions, but through communication, dialogue, and interaction” and they should “be aware of each other’s potential and capacities and make plans to benefit from them.”
Being united is also a means to ensure that “scientists and universities of the Islamic world work hand in hand together, the scholars of Islamic schools view each other in good faith and with tolerance and fairness, and they listen to each other's words.”
It also calls for greater synergy between “intellectual elites in all countries and of all denominations” based on commonalities, and “encourage coexistence and brotherhood.”
Hajj message – Preparing for new world orderUnity also means that “political and cultural leaders in Islamic countries” should gear up in a coordinated manner for the situation that will prevail in the “new world order,” as the West-led unipolar world order paves the way for the East-led multipolar world order.
These leaders “need to determine with their own hands and by their own will the proper place for the Islamic Ummah in the new global experience”, filled with “opportunities and threats.”
They should also "not allow the bitter experience of the political and territorial engineering of West Asia at the hands of Western governments after WWI to be repeated.”
Hajj message – Spirituality and ethics
Another important aspect is that of spirituality which means “advancing religious ethics."
The enchantment of “ethics minus religion,” which has long been promoted by Western elites, has “resulted in this unrestrained collapse of ethics in the West” being witnessed by everyone today.
The lessons of spirituality and ethics “should be learned” from the Hajj rituals -- “from the simplicity that exists in Ihram, from the negation of illusory privileges, from feeding the destitute and the needy, from the absence of sexual contact, vicious talk, and disputes, from the circumambulation of the entire Ummah around the axis of monotheism, from the stoning of the Devil [shaytān], and from the disavowal of the polytheists [mushrikīn].”
Hajj message – Taking advantage of spiritual experience  
It’s important that pilgrims “take advantage of the opportunity” that the annual Hajj pilgrimage and the spiritual experience provides “to contemplate and ponder on the secrets and mysteries of this unparalleled obligatory action and make it a provision” for the rest of their lives.
In today’s time more than in the past, “unity and spirituality” have been “subject to the enmity and sabotage of the arrogant powers and Zionism.”
The US and other centers of arrogance are “strongly opposed to the unity of Muslims”, as well as to the “understanding between nations, countries, and Islamic governments” and to the “religiosity and commitment to the religion of the younger generation in these nations.”
They are aggressively “opposed to the Muslim unity and they will fight these with any means they can”, so it is “the duty of all (Muslim) nations and governments to “stand against this evil scheme of the US and Zionist regime.”