Al Ubayyid


Al Ubayyid

(äl o͞obäyĭd`) or

El Obeid

(ĕl ōbād`), city (1993 pop. 229,425), S central Sudan. It is a rail terminus, a road and camel caravan junction, and the end of a pilgrim road from Nigeria. Al Ubayyid is also a trade and transshipment point. Founded by the Turko-Egyptian pashas in 1821, it fell to the Mahdists (see MahdiMahdi
[Arab.,=he who is divinely guided], in Sunni Islam, the restorer of the faith. He will appear at the end of time to restore justice on earth and establish universal Islam. The Mahdi will be preceded by al-Dajjal, a Muslim antichrist, who will be slain by Jesus.
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) in 1883 and was destroyed. Its reconstruction followed the fall of the Mahdist empire in 1898.