Mecca kilometer elevated metro transports pilgrims to holy sites Mount Arafat, Muzdalifah and Mina in the city during hajj reducing the congestion on the roads. Mecca Metro, officially known as Makkah Mass Rail Transit, is a planned four-line metro system for the city. This will be in addition to the Al Mashaaer Al Mugaddassah Metro which carries pilgrims during Hajj. A high speed inter-city rail line (Haramain High Speed Rail Project also known as the "Western Railway"), is under construction in Saudi Arabia. It will link along 444 kilometres (276 mi), the Muslim holy cities of Medina and Mecca via King
Mecca more when Ali, the fourth caliph, took power choosing Kufa as his capital. The Umayyad Caliphate moved the capital to Damascus in Syria and the Abbasid Caliphate to Baghdad, in modern-day Iraq, which remained the center of the Islamic Empire for nearly 500 years. Mecca re-entered Islamic political history during the Second Islamic Civil War, when it was held by Abd Allah ibn al-Zubayr, an early Muslim who opposed the Umayyad caliphs. The city was twice besieged by the Umayyads, in 683 and 692. For some time thereafter the city figured little in politics, remaining a city of devotion and