OUR COMMON BELIEFS

She is the Founder of OUR COMMON BELIEFS, where her vision is to share the commonality between the Abrahamic faiths from the Islamic perspective by doing various presentations on Islam.  By sharing her knowledge, she believes it will bring love and harmony  between our Christian and Jewish neighbors. She began OUR COMMON BELIEFS in March, 2017 after several very, very scary hate crimes.

 

 She has been giving presentations since 2001 in many churches, synagogues, libraries and universities.

 

She is a member of the interfaith committee of her masjid (mosque in Arabic), UWMS – Upper Westchester Muslim Society (www.uwms.org). 

She  is a member of  BOMA - the Briarcliff/Ossining Ministerial Association since 2001.

She is a member of the Rivertowns Clergy Association in Tarrytown. 

She is a member of the Interfaith Laymen's Association of Harrison.

She is a member of the MCW: Masajid Collabrative of Westchester.

She is a member of the WCAI: Weschester Coalition Against Islamophobia. 

 

She is a participant in a monthly Scriptural Reasoning program facilitated by Peace Catalyst International, DC Area and the ADAMS Center,  All Dulles Area Muslim Society of Virginia and Scriptural Reasoning, NY facilitated by several houses of worship and organization in New York City, one of them being MCN: Muslim Community Network.

 

 Our Common Beliefs, most recently, is one of the Supporting Organizations of the newly formed "Open Arms for Refugees", a Community Sponsor group comprising of many volunteers from Ossining, Briarcliff, Croton and Pleasantville, NY.

 

She is a member of an "ad hoc" coalition named the Empowering Women Worldwide: A Northern Westchester Interfaith Coalition of Croton-on-Hudson, N.Y. since 2012. The Coalition has been holding programs and preparing relief kits to be distributed where needed domestically or worldwide. 

 

The Coalition merged with several faith groups in Briarcliff Manor, Ossining and Scarborough, NY to form the Northern Westchester Interfaith Coalition for Refugee Resettlement in September, 2015.

 

She has been teaching beginning Arabic for over 10 years in two local weekend schools. She also began her own business, THE ARABIC SOUND GAME, (www.arabicsoundgame.com), where she teaches conversational/beginning Arabic with movement. She began the ARABIC SOUND GAME in January, 2015.

 

She is one of the co-founders of AMWA - The American Muslim Women’s Association, a women’s organization that builds bridges with local interfaith communities since 2002.

 

She was a facilitator in Walking Together, an interfaith program for Jewish, Christian and Muslim children in the 5th-7th grades and their parents. This program was developed by a Rabbi from Temple Israel of Northern Westchester.  The program was held for 3 consecutive Sunday afternoons twice a year.  Each Sunday the program was held in a different place of worship, i.e. Synagogue, Church or Masjid (Mosque).  The program was held from 1999-2006.  It was restarted again for 2 years from 2013-2015.

 

She is a student at the Al Maghrib Institute, Ijaazah Institute, and Imam Ghazali Institute.

 

She is a loving wife to Mahmoud Rafeh and a loving Mom to her two beautiful sons, Shareef 31 and Aly Rafeh, 28. 

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She enjoys exercising, playing with her cat, flower gardening, and bird watching.