Muslims in much of the Middle East will begin the fasting month of Ramadan on Wednesday during an especially gruelling time of the year, with sweltering heat and extremely long daylight hours. The Supreme Judicial Council of the Kingdom announced the siting of the crescent moon Tuesday evening, fixing the start of the ninth month of the lunar Islamic calendar on the following day. Officials in Bahrain, Egypt, Jordan, Lebanon, the Palestinian territories, Qatar, Syria, Libya, the United Arab Emirates and Yemen also announced the sighting of the new moon. The same was true for Sunni Muslims in Iraq, but the Shiite community will not begin until Thursday, as is the case with Oman. Muslims observe Ramadan by abstaining from food, drink and sex from dawn until sunset. However, pregnant and menstruating women, the sick, travelers and prepubescent children are exempt from the fast, which is one of the five pillars of Islam. Ramadan will begin amid scorching temperatures in the Middle East and elsewhere, with the first six months of 2010 being the warmest ever recorded. Most fasting Muslims go about their business as usual, if skimping an hour or two from work. Pieties increase, with additional optional prayers in the evening. Indonesia, the most populous Muslim country, will take the opportunity to crack down on Internet pornography. Quoting a poem at a press conference on Tuesday, Communications Minister Tifatul Sembiring called on Muslims to “keep hearts clean in the holy month,” and said that he would target websites and media that carried sexual content. In the Kingdom, several charitable organizations and philanthropists have erected Iftar tents – many of them air-conditioned – in open areas near mosques, bachelors quarters, and industrial cities. In expectation of a heavy inflow of Ramadan traffic, the King Fahd Causeway Authority (KFCA) is opening more lanes and fielding additional personnel to help regulate the flow of traffic. “Because of the expected increase in the number of passenger vehicles crossing the causeway in both directions during Ramadan, 18 lanes will be opened and additional personnel will be deployed,” a public relations official on the Saudi side of the causeway said.
