20th Safar 1440H / 2018
Karbala | Iraq

Millions of black-clad pilgrims from across the world are converging on the holy Iraqi city of Karbala to commemorate the Day of Arba’een, which marks 40 days since the martyrdom anniversary of Imam Hussein (PBUH), the third Shia Imam.

Large groups of mourners, most of them Iranians, are traveling on foot toward the holy city to take part in the largest annual Islamic gathering on earth.

They are set to reach Karbala — where Imam Hussein’s shrine is located — on October 30.
Thousands of security forces have been deployed along the routes leading to the holy city.

Iranian pilgrims head toward the shrine of Imam Hussein (PBUH), the third Shia Imam, in the holy city of Karbala on October 23, 2018, to mark Arba’een, the 40th day after the martyrdom anniversary of the Imam.
Arba’een, meaning “the fortieth” in Arabic, is observed 40 days after Ashura, the tenth day of the lunar calendar month of Muharram, when Imam Hussein, the grandson of Prophet Muhammad, was martyred along with dozens of his companions at the hands of the tyrant of the time, Yazid I, more than thirteen centuries ago.
Imam Hussein is a highly-venerated figure not only among Shia Mulims but also among Sunnis, Christians, and people of other faiths.
Millions of black-clad Shia pilgrims are converging on the holy city of Kerbala for the Arbaeen religious commemoration, the largest annual gathering of people anywhere on earth. Walking in long columns stretching back unbroken for as much as 50 miles, sleeping and eating in tents erected by supporters beside the road, the event has become an overwhelmingly powerful display of Shia belief and solidarity.

The Arbaeen coincides this year with the final defeat of Isis, the movement that slaughtered Shia in their tens of thousands and aimed to overthrow the Shia-dominated government in Baghdad. The Syrian army announced today that it has captured the last Isis-held town in Syria, Albu Kamal, its victory coming a few days after Isis was driven from western Iraq.

Arbaeen is the living symbol of the rise of the Iraqi Shia, a highly significant development in the Middle East, but it has happened only recently. Karim, 48, a tribal leader from Najaf, who provides free food for the pilgrims, recalls that when he first took part in an illegal Arbaeen walk under Saddam Hussein, “we had to take a roundabout route by the river [Euphrates] and try to keep hidden because, if we were caught, we would put in prison or executed”.

The Arbaeen has provided many modern-day Shia martyrs, murdered by Saddam Hussein, al-Qaeda and Isis, but its purpose is to mourn the martyrdom of Imam Hussein, the revered Shia leader, killed in the battle for Kerbala in AD680. The long ritual walk to his golden-domed shrine in that city – some walkers spend 10 or 12 days on the road from Basra or Kirkuk, others two or three days from Najaf – comes on the 40th day of the mourning period as religious fervour reaches its peak among the faithful.

Shia cities, towns and villages all over Iraq empty out during a 20-day period as their people take to the roads in an elaborately organised and well protected mass movement not seen anywhere else in the world. Estimates vary of the total attending, from highs of 15-17 million to a low of 6-7 million, but it includes at least two million Iranians whose numbers are easier to calculate because they require documentation to enter Iraq. Mohammed al-Hilli, the author of a book entitled The Arbaeen: the Walk, says that “the city of Kerbala can only contain two or three million people at one time, but, since pilgrims are coming and going over a long time, the total attending will be much higher.”
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