The Aramean Christian community has existed in the Land of Israel from time immemorial. Jesus and his Jewish family from the line of King David spoke Aramaic, as did all the residents of the Galilee region at that time. Only later did the Israeli Christian population go through a brutal forced process of arabization following the 7th century Muslim conquest.

 The Christians of the Fertile Crescent (comprised today of Israel, Lebanon, Syria and Iraq) are direct descendants of the Aramaic Syriac population that inhabited this region together with the Jews long before the Arab Muslim conquest.

Jews and Christians, from those early times and until today, share a common holy book. Both trace their spiritual origins to Abraham, Isaac and Jacob (Israel), and to the book of the prophets. Both pray and sing from the Psalms of King David, and many of our prayers are very similar in content, especially regarding our views of the outside world and...