The historic visit of the Al-Khayri sisters
Nuha (right) and Khanoum Al-Khayri at Open House
In mid January, 1995, we were deeply moved to welcome the Al-Khayri sisters to Open House which was their home before 1948. Nuha came from Ramallah and Khanoum all the way from Amman. They came to plant an olive tree with us in the yard. It was Tu B’Shvat, the New Year of the Trees in the Jewish calendar and Eid al-Shajara, Arbor Day in the Palestinian folk tradition.
All of us participated in digging, watering and putting the tree in the ground, including Raphael, Dalia and Yehezkel’s six-year-old son, and Dalia’s 90-year-old aunt Estel who lived in the house for many years after 1948. She made the effort to come from Jerusalem to meet the Al-Khayri sisters. Our volunteer gardener Hannah Genssler donated the sapling olive tree and orchestrated the planting operation. Also present were the children from the nursery school, their teachers, other staff members and volunteers.
The media was particularly interested in the feelings of the sisters on coming back to their home after so many years.
The sapling is now a big tree that yields fruit.
Here is what khanoum and Nuha Al-Khayri inscribed in our guest book
January 16, 1995:
“We are very happy for this opportunity to meet the Landau family in our common home. We greatly appreciate what Dalia has done, and we hope to see other ‘Dalias’ like her. We also pray that the olive tree we planted together will yield the fruits of love and true peace. We wish Michail Fanous [Co-Director of Open House from 1991 – 2003] and all the staff success in this project – may we all succeed together.”
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