-Well, sir, do you want it, sada?<\/p>\n\n\n\n
-Sorry? sada?<\/p>\n\n\n\n
This is the first time he has heard this word, an Arabic word used by the Turks as well, meaning without additives, and when it comes to a cup of coffee, it means without sugar.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
-The waiter apologized: I mean, do you want it without sugar, sir?<\/p>\n\n\n\n
-please.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
The garden was full of roses of various types and colors in front of him, with its pleasant smell, spreading its fragrance and comfort to those around them, and under the shades of its towering old trees, among the garden’s flowers humans of different races and religions mixed, thousands of birds took it as their habitat, the sound of its singing breaks the sound of its twigs in its sway with the wind breezes. How sweet is this coffee, not only the coffee but everything in here. A few meters away, the lovers walked under a bow of roses that stretched for a few meters, he remembered Christine,<\/p>\n\n\n\n
-“If only I had her now.”<\/p>\n\n\n\n
His schedule is too busy today, also he has to meet Sheikh Ruslan.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Turkish people, the majority of them, are Muslims, who follow the Sufi sect, and most of this majority follow the Naqshbandi order, more precisely, the Naqshbandi al-Khalidiya, which took its name from Khalid al-Baghdadi, who died in the nineteenth century.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
They always thought of this fragmentation and spallation. Indeed, it is present in all religions, in all parties, in all groups, and every other thing.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Why do humans divide if we put two people in one room for the rest of their lives, they would be divided into two communities. Every Apostle came with one religion, but the adherents insisted on splitting and fragmentation, each one of its creeds, each sect branched into sects, and soon they began to struggle. It is as if human temperament is dominated by fragmentation, division, and even God’s religion did not spare.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Just months ago, he would not have thought that he would be doing this extensive research on Sufism, or getting to know someone online, not to mention traveling to meet them, here in Istanbul. But what happened on his visit with his mother to Israel sparked a chain of events beyond all imagination, what he heard was a time defector, and the physicist within him tickled.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
And another thing, revenge is like love, makes miracles.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Boarding his flight from Boston Logan International Airport, 9:50 a.m., one-hour flight to John F. Kennedy, Washington, one-hour quick wait, then a second 10-hour flight to Ben Gurion International Airport in Tel Aviv.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
He found his mother waiting for him at the airport, overjoyed.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
-Is prayer worth all this travel and trouble, mom?<\/p>\n\n\n\n
– Not the time to tease your mother, come to hug you, I miss you son.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
– Only two days, then I will go back to the institute, I have some engagements before the end of the vacation<\/p>\n\n\n\n
– Well, son, today we are going to visit your grandmother, she misses you, she has prepared for us a feast to which all the family is invited, tomorrow you rest, the next is the prayer day, and then you are free to go.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
A hearty dinner, and a family evening punctuated by many memories, joking, and mockery of this fairy-tale Islamic story about the Wailing Wall. His mother’s giggle:” lightning man, that liar!”<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Two days later, he and his mother boarded the car, heading to Jerusalem, to the Wailing Wall. An hour and a quarter are the distance from Old Jaffa or Tel Aviv.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Named “Tel al-Rabi ‘” in Arabic, it was a small neighborhood in the Palestinian city of Jaffa, and after the establishment of Israel in 1948 it expanded this neighborhood, the nucleus of the capital of Israel until it devoured the entire city of Jaffa.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
“Jerusalem is a beautiful city, only disturbed by that one.” His mother said. Then the huge, glittering golden dome appeared under the sun of Jerusalem.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Muslims call it the Dome of the Rock, built by the Umayyad caliph Abd al-Malik ibn Marwan in 691 AD, after six years of hard work, in its vicinity is the second purest Muslim holy site, Al-Aqsa Mosque, after Mecca. It is not known when the Al-Aqsa Mosque was first built; Among the historians, some said that Adam, the father of humans, built it, while some said that he was Shem, the son of Noah, and others said that he was the prophet of God, Ibrahim. It must be very old as humans themselves.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
A building of such importance, great wars fought throughout history for it, strange stories! Prophets and messengers, old enough to forget who built it first and when it was built! A special significance throughout history has been rebuilt and rebuilt many times, next to it lies the Jews’ most sacred place, the Wining Wall, saying that what remains of the temple of God’s prophet is buried somewhere beneath this earth, not far from it, in the Christian Quarter, the Sepulcher stands tall, defying time, wars and massacres. Christians say that Jesus, the son of Mary, was crucified where it was built, for them it is the purest part of the earth.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
A century and a half ago, this land and what is on it became the Muslim domain, or so they claimed, when their prophet, Muhammad, headed for it from Mecca in the Arabian Peninsula, thousands of miles away, prostrated the first prostration of their prayers.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
On that day, Al-Aqsa Mosque acquired its name, the first of the two Qiblas, and after this prostration, the Muslims decided that it was theirs, and their Prophet ordered them to take it back and gave them good tidings of that. This happened only a few years after his death under his second successor, Omar ibn Khattab.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Although it was under the control of the greatest empire at that time, the Roman Empire, in a dramatic way, similar to the stories of One Thousand and One Nights, in 636, a few thousand Muslims defeated the Roman Empire and its quarter-million-strong army at the Battle of Yarmouk in Jordan.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
And this coincides with the same year that a few thousand more of them, fighting far away in Iraq and Iran, were able to destroy the second greatest empire of their time, the Persian Empire, announcing a new empire that would resonate across the globe.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
His mother wished that this mosque was not here, for the Jews believe that somewhere beneath this building is the temple of God’s prophet Solomon. Because it is sacred to Muslims, no one has dared to destroy it in the 74 years since the establishment of Israel and its control of the city. They believe that if it was touched by something, it would get the whole world out of control. It is as sacred to Muslims as Mecca.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Although several Jewish groups and extremists have tried to destroy it, some have already tried to burn it. Also, excavations are carried out under the pretext of searching for the temple beneath, and Muslims accuse Israel of aiming to demolish it.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Whenever Israeli forces enter the mosque’s courtyard, the whole of Jerusalem is inflamed, and there are bloody clashes between them and its Muslim inhabitants.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
From the time it was inhabited by the Canaanites, and entered by the prophet of God, Moses, the sons of Israel, through Jesus, the son of Mary, the prophet of God (as the Muslims say), or the son of God (as the Christians say), name him as you please, empires and kingdoms passed over it. This land remained in turmoil and that mosque remained standing. Everyone wants it, everyone claims to own it.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Then after the conquest of it by the Muslims, the Christians launched the Crusades, which began under Pope Urban II, the armies of Europe, and continued for nearly two hundred years since 1096 AD.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
The Crusaders recovered it from the Muslims in 1099 and much of the Levant remained under their rule, and the volcano remained in the hearts of the Muslims to boil, until 1187 when its lava, led by the Muslim leader Saladin, erupted and was recaptured. Then the Second Crusades began, led by Richard the Lionheart, which were defeated.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Peace was finally restored in the city of peace for nearly the next 800 years. It flourished, becoming a beacon of science and culture, bringing together all religions, quietly, with love and harmony, until the Ottoman Empire fell in 1924, and Britain occupied Palestine, then handed it over to the Jews to declare the establishment of Israel and to resume the turmoil.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Today it was one of the millions of them!<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
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