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R Prasannan
R Prasannan

HOSPITALITY

The Ansaris and Indian hospice in Jerusalem

Having been received by President Pranab Mukherjee, and having hosted Foreign Ministers Jaswant Singh, S.M. Krishna and Sushma Swaraj on their premises of amity, the Ansaris of Jerusalem expect to have the honour of meeting the first Indian prime minister who visits Israel.

Indian-hospice Indian hospice in Jerusalem

The Ansaris, who hail from Saharanpur in Uttar Pradesh, have been living in Jerusalem for three generations since 1924, and running the 800-year-old Indian Hospice there. Every Indian dignitary who comes to Israel either call at their hospice or receive them for at least a few minutes. Through eight centuries of strife, the place they run has remained a place of piety, compassion and hospitality.

Sheikh Mohammed Munir, the second generation Ansari who is close to 90, is the current director. He was honoured with Pravasi Bharatiya Samman in 2011.

The hospice they run has a hoary tradition. Situated near the famous Herod's Gate in the Old City of Jerusalem, it is believed to have been the prayer hall of a Sufi saint from Faridkot 800 years ago. Legend has it that Sufi saint Hazrat Farid ud-Din Ganj Shakar (better known as Baba Farid) from Faridkot in Punjab, came to Jerusalem around the year 1200 (soon after the third crusade), and spent his days fasting in a cave near the al-Aqsa mosque. He returned to Faridkot, but his prayer spot became a favourite resting place of Indian pilgrims on their way to Mecca or back. The place thus became a pilgrims' inn. 

After the defeat of the Ottoman empire and the fall of Jerusalem to the British in 1917, the hospice became a hospital and resting place for hundreds of Indian troops. It was then that the Grand Mufti of Palestine Haj Amin Hussein travelled to India on the invitation of the Ali brothers who were Mahatma Gandhi's friends and were active in the Khilafat movement. The Grand Mufti invited Sheikh Nazir Ansari, who was friends with the Ali brothers, to Jerusalem to run the hospice. The Sheikh was succeeded by his eldest son Mohammed Munir Ansari, the present director. 

baba-farid-prayer-cave Baba Farid's prayer cave

“There were actually several Indian hospices set up in the last 800 years,” explained Naseer Ansari, a civil engineer and the younger son of Mohammed Ansari. “Our grandfather traded those and bought up all these premises around the old Baba Farid's hospice. It is now 7,000 square metres.”

Several of the buildings, which house clinics, living-rooms, a library, a small mosque and envelops Baba Farid's prayer cave, were built with the help of native Indian rulers like the Nizam of Hyderabad and nawabs of Rampur and Bahawalpur (now in Pakistan) during the British days. 

The hospice again hosted a relief camp for Indian soldiers during the second world war, and was hailed as an island of peace and hope during the strife-torn 1940s when the state of Israel was formed amid a war. A UN clinic was opened within the premises then. In the Six-Day war of 1967, bombs fell on the spot and three of the family were killed. The spot then came under Israeli control, along with the city of Jerusalem. “But since India didn't have an embassy in Israel, our visitors used to come through the Indian embassy in Jordan,” said Nazeer Ansari. 

Incidentally, all the Ansaris—even the fourth generation who are in their teens—still hold Indian passports. Their municipal issues are handled by the government of Israel, their waqf issues by Jordan, other matters by the Palestine government. If the elder Ansari has been feted by the Indian government, the eldest son Nasser Ansari (who will succeed him) has been honoured with a Member of the British Empire by Queen Elizabeth in 2003. 

A few years ago, Indian ambassador to Israel Navtej Sarna, personally researched old records with the hospice and the Jerusalem authorities and wrote a book about it. 

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