Monitoring Desk
ISLAMABAD: The United Arab Emirates has opened a center housing a mosque, church and the first official synagogue in the country’s history, intending to promote interfaith harmony and coexistence in the Muslim nation.
While normalizing ties with Israel in 2020, the oil-rich Gulf federation is home to a minimal but active Jewish community that usually offers their prayers in private.
UAE’s first synagogue center
With three houses of worship located in the same place, the Abrahamic Family House, inaugurated on Thursday in the capital Abu Dhabi, is the first of its kind.
“The worship center will be a platform for learning and dialogue, a model of coexistence,” said its president, Mohamed Khalifa Al Mubarak in a statement released on Friday.
“The visitors are invited to take part in religious services, guided tours, celebrations, and opportunities to explore faith”, he said
The 3 houses of worship are of equal stature and share the exact dimensions of the exterior.
The only other synagogue in the Gulf region is in Bahrain, which also has a small Jewish community.
The Association of Gulf Jewish Communities appreciated the UAE for opening another house of worship in the region, adding that they were excited to see a second synagogue built in the GCC (Gulf Cooperation Council).
The 2020 normalization of ties between the UAE and Israel was part of the US-brokered Abraham Accords that also witnessed the Jewish state establish diplomatic ties with Bahrain and Morocco.
The UAE was the first Gulf nation to normalize relations with Israel and only the third Arab nation after Egypt and Jordan.
The Abraham Accords broke with long-standing pan-Arab policy to isolate Israel until it withdrew from the occupied territories and accepted Palestinian statehood.
