The Siege of Mecca The Siege of Mecca The Siege of Mecca: The Forgotten Uprising in Islam's Holiest Shrine and the Birth of Al Qaeda is a 2007 book by Wall Street Journal correspondent Yaroslav Trofimov about the 1979 Grand Mosque seizure in Mecca. Hundreds of Islamic radicals led by Saudi preacher Juhayman al-Otaybi invaded the Masjid al-Haram in Mecca, Islam's holiest shrine, on Nov. 20, 1979. The intruders included men from all over the Muslim world and a handful of American converts. Tens of thousands of worshipers were trapped inside the compound. The battle for the shrine lasted two weeks, causing hundreds of
Mecca to in the afternoon. Summer temperatures are extremely hot and consistently break the mark in the afternoon, dropping to in the evening. Rain usually falls in Mecca in small amounts scattered between November and January. Mecca houses Al-Haram Mosque, the largest mosque in the world. The mosque surrounds the Kaaba, which Muslims turn towards while offering daily prayer. This mosque is also commonly known as the "Ḥaram" or "Grand Mosque". As mentioned above, because of the Wahhabist hostility to reverence being paid to historic and religious buildings, Mecca has lost most of its heritage in recent years and few buildings