Faizel Patel, Radio Islam News- 2013-05-09

While the animosity and feud between Palestinians and Jews rages on for a free Palestine, Jews and Muslims in another part of the world have united to bury the hatchet and their differences.

Jews and Muslims will share the last available burial space at Rookwood Cemetery in Sydney, Australia to avoid a critical shortage that would have caused the Muslims to run out of space to bury their dead within three months.

The two faiths will share Lot 10 cemetery, which is big enough to house eight rugby fields. It had been created by closing a road within the cemetery.

Ahmad Kamaledine, the Muslim representative on the Rookwood General Cemeteries Trust said ''It couldn't have come any sooner. The agreement had been 20 years in the making, and the Muslims had been down to their last 80 places, enough for only three months.”

''Being able to see [members of] the Jewish and Muslim community being buried side by side and sharing the same ground will demonstrate the willingness of the community in Australia to work together,'' said Kamaledine.

Meanwhile NSW Jewish Board of Deputies president Yair Miller said, “This initiative shows on a practical level how our communities can work together on a number of initiatives here in Australia – that communities that don't come from the same ethnic or religious background can, when needed, and it should happen all the time, come together for the common good."

The burial spaces for the two religions will be divided by small existing roads in the cemetery.