Two million Muslims prayed yesterday at the site of the Prophet Muhammad's last sermon 14 centuries ago on the plain of Arafat, the high point of the annual haj pilgrimage.
"Here I am, Allah, answering your call. There is no other God but you," they chanted in unison as they gathered on the Arafat plain, 20 km from Mecca, for a day of prayer and meditation.
"Jerusalem is suffering under the occupation of pillaging Jews, who are oppressing our weakened Muslim brothers in Palestine under the gaze of those who call for human rights to be defended," said Saudi Arabia's leading cleric, Sheikh Abdelaziz bin Abdullah al-Sheikh, in his sermon.
"Where are the disciples of human rights who do not stop spitting out hostile words against Islam like a poison?" Sheikh Abdelaziz asked.
The Mufti also criticised human rights organisations "who pretend to want rights for women, men and animals, all the while failing to mention our Muslim brothers, killed, dispersed and whose land has been pillaged".
"Islam guaranteed women's rights," he said, urging Muslims throughout the world to abide by Islamic law, or Sharia.
The pilgrims - the men clad in two-piece seamless white cloth, the women covered except for the hands and face as a symbol of equality - converged on Arafat by bus and on foot from a tent city in Mina, where they spent the night.
Many carried umbrellas to keep off the Gulf sun as temperatures soared to 30C and humidity picked up under a light cloud covering.
Thousands of sprinklers sprayed a fine mist to cool the pilgrims, while drinking water and fruit juices were handed out free of charge to the slow-moving mass of bodies on the Arafat plain, where cases of exhaustion and fainting are common during the rituals, especially among the elderly and sick.
As part of measures to avoid dangerous bottlenecks, civil defence helicopters hovered overhead to ensure crowd control, while clinics to provide first aid dotted the route.
The second day of pilgrimage had begun without any major incident, Saudi authorities reported yesterday. But the Russian embassy in Riyadh said that police in Mecca had arrested 59 pilgrims from the Russian republic of Dagestan over the past week for trying to sell weapons, including rifles, swords and night-vision goggles to fellow Muslims. The group, part of around 2,000 who had travelled overland from Dagestan, were later released "in an act of tolerance" .