Bahá’í New Year brings spring to Jerusalem

The vernal equinox - the first day of spring - is also the Bahá’í New Year, or Naw-Ruz, which Israel's community celebrated Wednesday evening with a reception at the David Citadel Hotel in Jerusalem. Despite the cool weather outside, organizers of the reception managed to create a feeling of spring inside the hotel, decorating it with hundreds of flowers and saplings that were brought to Jerusalem from the famed Bahá’í gardens in Haifa. At the end of the festivites, the plants and trees were returned to their places in the gardens. Foreign Minister Shimon Peres, the guest speaker at the event, thanked the Bahá’í for "bringing beauty to our lives... At a time when we are digging trenches," he added, "You are planting gardens."

(Gavin Rabinowitz) March, 2002