A Blog by Mohamad Jamous
JERICHO, PALESTINIAN TERRITORIES
June 11th, 2018 Our Iftar this year was beautiful and distinctive! It was particularly special because it happened in Palestine, especially in the oldest city in the world, Jericho. At 18:00 pm on Friday evening, I went to the Green Valley Restaurant in Jericho, and I hung three banners for the Abrahamic Reunion and I arranged the place beautifully and harmoniously, and I emphasized to the staff of the restaurant to do everything as ordered and required. 
At 19:00 in the evening, the guests began to arrive. Sheikh Ghassan Manasra, the International Director of the Abrahamic Reunion, was the first to arrive with his family, and Rev. Cherag Anna Less, PhD, Co-Founder & Abrahamic Reuniuon International Executive Director. Also attending were Father Firass Dyab – The Greek Orthodox Priest of Zababdeh, Palestine; and Sheikh Imad Abu Shelbaya - the Imam of Masjid al Zababdeh in Palestine; and Father Pachomius- The Egyptian Coptic Priest of Jericho; our coordinator in Nablus, Mohammed Saeed and his group; Raed Hamisha and his group from Jerusalem. Our coordinator in Bethlehem, Musa Sabateen also arrived with his group, as well as some of my team and guests from Jericho. THE NUMBER OF THE PARTICIPANTS WAS 70 PERSONS ! 
After everyone's arrival, I welcomed everyone and thanked them for coming. and I invited all participants to pray in preparation for the Iftar. At about 19:45, we all began to eat. The food was very tasty and included turkeys, stuffed vine leaves, stuffed vegetables, rice and chicken, varied salads, varied fruits, and cold and hot drinks. After we finished eating, we took a short break, and at 20:30 pm, I welcomed again the guests and participants and talked about the Abrahamic Reunion’s objectives, members, and goals. Then we invited Father Firass Dyab to give a speech, and he said : I am honored to be with you today. I am a Palestinian Christian Arab priest and this is my identity: we are all born human beings and we go back to one father, Ibrahim al-Khalili [the Prophet Abraham He continued his speech and said: I am a Palestinian Arab Christian. I love the Prophet Muhammad, I love Islam and the Holy Quran and I love my “Arabism” very much. He said “I would like to live in this country with the Druze, Jews and Muslims and build this country together.” Then he ended his speech by thanking all those who had made this beautiful meeting and this wonderful Iftar . 
Then i invited Sheikh Imad Abu Shalabya, the Imam of Masjid al-Zababdeh, to give a speech and he began his speech with a quotation from the Quran and then he narrated the story of how the Prophet Muhammad encouraged his earliest followers to flee to Abyssinia for refuge when they were being persecuted by the Kuraysh tribe of Mecca. Finally, he emphasized the importance of interfaith work and the importance of coexistence and dialogue amongall, because we are ultimately all human. 
After Sheikh Imad’s speech, we invited Father Pachomius, the Egyptian Coptic priest of Jericho, to give his speech, and indeed it was a very wonderful speech! Father Pachomius, at the beginning of his speech, thanked everyone for this meeting and said it is nice to sit together with each other in a human session, because at the beginning and at the end, I am a human. Then he continued to speak: We believe in only one God and we believe that there is a second life after death, and we also believe in the good deeds as love, respect, and help all others. Our first priority is to live as human beings, to love one another, to respect one another, even if we have different religions, colors, and languages. "Our first priority is to live as human beings, to love one another, to respect one another, even if we have different religions, colors, and languages."
Then, at the end of his speech, he thanked Mohamad jamous for the great meeting and beautiful Iftar, and he thanked all the members of the Abrahamic Reunion and he said that this generosity of the Abrahamic Reunion is what religion is meant to be.  After the words of the beautiful guests ended, we invited Sheikh Ghassan Manasra, to give his speech. First he thanked all the guests for their presence and for their very beautiful words, and he said that our ethics are what determine our work, our relationship and our history !
And he said religion is a message from God to humanity, and he said: "There is a love relationship between me and God, and my religion is a private connection between me and God. Each person’s religion is their way of loving God. This relationship is private. So hold your relationship with God, and also your religion, to yourself, so your religion will remain private between you and God. He also said that our responsibility is great in this country, and we must unite all of us to achieve our goals At the end of his speech, he emphasized the huge upcoming programs of Abrahamic Reunion, and he said: We are such a force that we can be a storm of love, and we together can remove the thorns in our way. And then he thanked all the organizers of this meeting and the wonderful day of coordinators, participants and program managers. We then bid farewell to the guests and participants, and thanked them for coming today in the hope of meeting them again in the future. *Due to Israeli law, Israelis are not not allowed to enter the West Bank, so Abrahamic Reunion events in the West Bank are not available to Israeli participants. |
