Mohammed Bin Zayed University for Humanities (From Facebook)
In another sign of the thawing in relations between the Jewish and Arab worlds, since the Abraham Accords were signed, New York’s Yeshiva University will host a first-ever Jewish Studies Conference in Dubai in the UAE on Wednesday. The university is calling the event “historic” and it will be held in cooperation with the Mohammed Bin Zayed University for Humanities.
The program, titled “Interacting Philosophies, Shared Friendships,” will be presented in partnership with Yeshiva University’s Bernard Revel Graduate School, Rabbi Arthur Schneier Program for International Affairs, and the Straus Center for Torah and Western Thought and will focus on the medieval scholar Moses Maimonides. Maimonides famously served in the courts of Arab sultans.
The Abraham Accords were a peace agreement between Israel and two Arab Gulf nations – the UAE and Bahrain – signed in the summer of 2020. Two Arab African nations – Morocco and Sudan – later joined the Accords as well.
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“We are proud to be partnering with academic colleagues and both the Muslim and Jewish communities as we enrich each other through shared learning and strengthened friendship,” said YU’s Rabbi Dr. Stuart Halpern, who is coordinating the program.
After the conference, participants will tour the Abrahamic Family House, which encompasses a mosque, a church, a synagogue and a Forum to “learn and nurture mutual understanding, the Abrahamic Family House welcomes people from all walks of life to exchange knowledge and practice faith.”
“Writing in Newsweek following the 2021 Holocaust Commemoration event, YU’s President Berman had noted that ‘The biblical brothers Isaac and Ishmael stand to embrace each other once more. This opportunity calls for attention and investments, in areas like education, that humanize and enrich people’s understanding of one another,” said YU’s Rabbi Dr. Stuart Halpern, Senior Adviser to the Provost and Deputy Director of the Straus Center, who is coordinating the program with the Museum’s founder, Ahmed Almansoori, a former member of the United Arab Emirates Federal National Council. “We are proud to be partnering with academic colleagues and both the Muslim and Jewish communities as we enrich each other through shared learning and strengthened friendship.”
