On the streets of the city of Haifa, home to a diverse population of Jews, Arab Christians and Muslims, a series of painted yellow footprints appeared in the ramshackle Wadi Nisnas neighborhood in late November, leading the visitor on a walking tour around the city to witness a very special street festival.
The "Holiday of Holidays", now running throughout December, is a coming-together of three religious traditions that each celebrate a festival during the closing months of the year: a combination of Christian Christmas, Jewish Hanukkah, and Muslim Eid Al Fitr, signifying the end of Ramadan.
Now in its eleventh year, the festival attracts tens of thousands of visitors to the northern Israeli city over a four-week period.
Alongside the Christmas markets - where Santa-suited salesmen sell traditional Arabic snacks - children's workshops, literary events and meetings on co-existence mark a welcome change from the manifold tensions constantly surfacing between Israel's religious populations.
And in the atmospheric, predominantly Arab Wadi Nisnas area, a multicultural street exhibition entitled "The Playing Arena" blends seamlessly into the local landscape, with sculptures, murals and installations appearing on the sides, tops and fronts of buildings, some lived-in, some abandoned.
Walking the narrow, winding streets of the quarter, past tiny hole-in-the-wall Muslim grocery stores and Jewish kosher food stands, the visitor is confronted with an array of works of public art, created by and for members of all faiths.
In front of Beit Hagefen, an Arab-Jewish community center, three huge wrought iron gates are displayed. The first is topped with a Star of David, the second with an Islamic crescent moon and the third with a Christian cross. Further down the street, a mural painted onto a wall outside an Arabic newspaper office depicts images of various races in peaceful coexistence.
Some of the works are politically or religiously motivated, some not. Still others leave their message open to the spectator: at a crossroads, a traffic light installation flashes two alternate signs. One states that the Messiah "is coming" in green light, the second that he is "not coming" in red.
But it is not only within the confines of the festival route that elements of all three faiths' celebrations are apparent in the city. Residents, too, freely express their festivals in household decorations and shop goods. Several stores twinkle with Christmas decorations: tinsel, baubles, golden stars and fairy lights. Others sell traditional Hanukkah foods, such as the ubiquitous suvganiot, sugary jam doughnuts, and deep-fried potato latkes.
The aroma of strong Arabic coffee drifts from tiny stands loaded with sticky honey-drenched pastries, often eaten to celebrate the end of the fasting period of Ramadan. And in an apartment above the market stalls, a Santa Claus figure peers down from an open window, whilst next door, a Hanukkah candelabra glows with four lighted candles.
But although the concept behind the "Holiday of Holidays" might be unique within Israel, the phenomenon of mixed-faith celebrations, on a global level, is becoming rapidly more popular, due to increasing intermarriage between Christians, Jews and Muslims.
For example, it is estimated that in the United States there are approximately 2.5 million families with both Christian and Jewish members, and that around 50 percent of young American Jews today marry outside their faith. There is, therefore, an increasing call for a form of celebration that embraces a whole host of religious requirements. In response to this demand several companies have sprung up to serve mixed-faith holidays.
The first of such enterprises, US-based company 'Mixed Blessing', has been catering to the holiday requirements of mainly American 'interfaith' families for the last 16 years, supplying greetings cards which depict combinations of traditional festival images.
The company, owned by Elise and Philip Okrend was begun in December 1988 when the couple debated what kind of holiday greeting card to send to their friends in interfaith relationships. Instead of sending two separate cards or one non-denominational card, Elise, an artist, sketched a picture of a Star of David merging with a Christmas tree. Their friends loved the card and the idea so much that 'Mixed Blessing' was soon born.
Nowadays, their selection of greetings cards is huge, filled with lighthearted images such as two dogs in front of a pile of gifts, one dog wearing a hat in the shape of reindeer antlers, the other wearing one in the shape of a menorah. Children's story books, Christmas tree ornaments, T-shirts and coffee cups can all be purchased from their online store, to make holiday time appropriate, and comfortable, for everyone within a mixed-faith family.
But the integration does not stop there. There is even a new word, "Christmukkah", now a common phrase on the Internet, to describe the coming-together of two religious festivals.
Such a term, endorsed by several Jewish Reform rabbis such as leading British Rabbi Jonathan Romain, even has its own web 'blogging' site at www.christmukkah.org where festive tales and jokes abound.
"Every night for eight nights we set the Christmas tree on fire," quips message-poster Nick Carraway on the site, referring to the Jewish tradition of lighting one candle per night for eight nights during Hanukkah.
Whilst there is considerable controversy over intermarriage within each of the three faiths, such sites display a lighter side to a contentious issue, illustrating just one way in which it is possible for cultural differences to be celebrated, rather than ignored or opposed.
Back on the streets of Wadi Nisnas, the air is thick with the scent of wood fires and roasted chestnuts, and visitors of all denominations enjoy the brief respite from the tensions racking the country. And the residents of Haifa are justly-proud of their tolerance for others' beliefs.
"It's not like this in Jerusalem, you know," says the Arab proprietor of one spice shop, as he watches the crowds of visitors stroll by. "There, people keep to their own neighborhoods, they don't mingle. But here, we live easily together. It's as it should be."
Diverse faiths celebrate as one in Haifa
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