Hajj starts Monday and it’s unlike anything we’ve seen before — a wartime pilgrimage.

The Iran war has shaken flight routes and cut Iranian numbers by two-thirds, but Saudi Arabia says over 1.5 million foreign pilgrims have still arrived.

It's Hajj week, and this one’s different. With the Iran war still rumbling, Saudi Arabia is hosting its first wartime pilgrimage in modern history, cbinews.tv reports.

The Day of Arafah is Monday May 26, and despite closed airspace, cancelled flights and spiking insurance costs, the pilgrims have kept coming. So what’s the damage to numbers?

Well, it’s mixed. As of Friday, more than 1.518 million foreign pilgrims had already landed in the Kingdom. That’s actually up on 2025, when 1.506 million came from abroad. Total 2025 Hajj was 1.67 million — down from 1.83 million in 2024 after that brutal heatwave killed 1,300 people.

This year, the target was around 1.8 million. But with the war kicking off in late February, regional analysts now reckon we’ll land somewhere between 1.2 to 1.5 million.

Early registration back in April was only 750,000, so things were looking shaky. Biggest hit? Iran. Iran usually gets a quota of 87,550. This year they’re sending just 30,000 — only 34% of their allocation. That’s a massive drop from 2024 when they filled the whole quota. Direct flights between Tehran and Riyadh are impossible right now, so those 30,000 are coming in via Iraq’s Arar crossing. Saudi actually used that same crossing to evacuate 77,000 Iranians after the war began on 28 February. Now it’s bringing them back in. Saudi did suspend visit visas for 14 countries including Iran, Nigeria and Pakistan, but official Hajj permit holders are exempt. Still, the “practical barriers” for Iranians are huge — airspace is a conflict zone and carriers have pulled routes. Other countries?

Still turning up. Indonesia's got a quota of 221,000 and demand stayed solid. Pakistan, with 180,000 slots, had nearly 9,000 pilgrims in Madinah by late April. The main headaches have been aviation chaos — 130+ cancelled flights — and travel costs.

Insurance alone has priced some people out. So yes, the Iran war has definitely dented Hajj 2026. Iranian numbers crashed, and we’ll likely come in below the usual 1.7-1.9 million baseline. But given the circumstances, 1.5 million+ foreign pilgrims already in the Kingdom is remarkable. Day of Arafah is Monday. The next 48 hours will tell us the final count.

Source: cbinews.tv

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