"Ibrahim is a short Palestinian man, around seventy years old, with close-cropped white hair and a stubbly white beard. He’s a friendly, generous character who for the past thirty years has opened up his home to travelers from all over the world. Anyone can stay at his house for however long she likes — no questions asked. Payment is however much you can afford. There’s a collection box next to the kitchen. Nobody asks you to pay, and nobody checks how much you’ve put in, or even if you’ve contributed at all. Ibrahim carries no passport and claims no allegiance to any nation. Yet he travels around the world promoting peace. He has a few favorite travel stories that he repeats over and over to whoever comes around.
I think he said he was a Sufi, though someone else at the house told me he wasn’t. In any case, he is Muslim, but he believes that all religions are equally valid. “People who have never been here think there is a wall between the Arabs and the Jews and that we are both dangerous people,” Ibrahim says. “We are both really good people.” He doesn’t see the situation in his homeland as hopeless. “We have a lot of love, which we have learned from our religion, love and peace. A lot of goodness has happened in the land between Jewish and Palestinian brothers, the seeds of Abraham.”
~ Brad Warner, There Is No God and He Is Always with You: A Search for God in Odd Places
Photo of Palestinian from National Geographic
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