Another Hajj Tragedy
Hundreds of people died during a stampede during the Hajj pilgrimage near Mecca -- this just weeks after a crane collapse at the Grand Mosque in Mecca killed more than 100 people.
Mustafa Hameed, a journalist who writes for Foreign Policy, ABC News and Vice, and Brian Murphy, Washington Post staff writer, discuss the latest incident and looks at the infrastructure in and around Mecca, which Hameed says is wholly inadequate and unable to handle the huge numbers of pilgrims who flock to the area each year.
Now: 717 ppl were killed in this year's Hajj in Mecca. Discussing w/ @MustafaHameed + @washingtonpost Brian Murphy. pic.twitter.com/U00T3IIwyl
— Brian Lehrer Show (@BrianLehrer) September 25, 2015
"There is an arithmetic to these sorts of stampedes," explains @MustafaHameed. "Spaces are narrow, and every year more people go."
— Brian Lehrer Show (@BrianLehrer) September 25, 2015
Sadly, safety lags behind luxury in priority of construction efforts for #Hajj, as I wrote in @ForeignPolicy. http://t.co/bhoMOz2N7b #Mecca
— Mustafa Hameed (@MustafaHameed) September 24, 2015
