Religion Saudi Arabia

Despite calls for patience and courteousness, pilgrims pushed and shoved their way Friday around the Grand Mosque, where more than 1.5 million Muslims gathered to pray. On this last Muslim Sabbath before the peak of the hajj, the annual pilgrimage to holy sites in Saudi Arabia, the prayer leader urged pilgrims to be "kind, gentle, patient and tolerant to other pilgrims while they are performing the rituals.

Creating a sea of white robes, more than 2 million Muslims stood in prayer Monday in 100-degree heat at Arafat, the mount overlooking Mecca where the prophet Muhammad delivered his last sermon 14 centuries ago.

When the body of nurse Yvonne Gilford was found Dec. 11, fear rippled through the walled compounds where foreigners live in Saudi Arabia. The 55-year-old Australian had suffered a grisly death.

Declaring that Islamic law "underlines the necessity of preserving man's dignity and his legitimate rights," a group of Saudi Arabian scholars earlier this month formed the conservative kingdom's first human rights organization.

A professor at King Abdulaziz University was giving a lesson last month on politics and activism, terrorism and tolerance. The recent killing of Egyptian secularist author Farag Foda by Islamic extremists came up.

Almost five months after their bold crime, the women who dared to drive are still jobless and trapped in a country where they have suffered scorn and ridicule.

Their black cloaks and veils hanging neatly in the marble foyer, Omaima Khamis, her sisters and girlfriends gathered in the parlor to eat dates, drink spiced coffee and discuss fashion, family and astrological signs.

American and British commanders Friday warned soldiers not to eat, drink or smoke in public during daylight when the Muslim fasting month of Ramadan begins Sunday.