First Muslim CEO of Jerusalem YMCA

Forsan Hussein is one of the most influential of Israel's young Arabs, becoming known as the Israeli Obama. He has recently been appointed the first non-Christian CEO of Jerusalem International YMCA.

This YMCA is definitely not your father's YMCA. Housed in what has been described as the most beautiful YMCA in the world, it attracts the rich and famous and serves often as a place where international diplomats and activists from east and west Jerusalem meet for intimate get-togethers as well as for more lavish functions.

Hussein was born and grew up in the Israeli Muslim Arab village of Sha'ab, near Acre, north of Haifa. While he graduated high school with a near perfect score of 98on his exams, he couldn't afford university and went to work in an industrial park. But in 2006 he won a a scholarship to study at Brandeis University in the US.

Fitting in with and moving easily between life in America and life in Israel, including both the Tel Aviv nightlife scene and the small Arab village where he grew up, the soon-to-be-married Hussein is hoping to use all his life experience to turn the Jerusalem Y into something bigger than it already is. Quoted by Israel21c (its article can be found at http://www.israel21c.org/201005047924/people/the-qisraeli-obamaq-takes-on-the-y) , he says:

"I was born and raised as a Muslim. What sets me apart here is that my appointment is groundbreaking. I'm the first Muslim to head the Y since it was established," says Hussein, whose duty it will be to make sure that the Y, owned by the YMCA of the USA, will gain financial independence.

"[W]e are trying to make the Y an example of what Jerusalem should be - a dynamic interfaith peace center," says Hussein.

"In our renewed vision we want to position it, and develop and empower its ethical values and moral citizenship. There will be many different activities tackling this," Hussein continues.

"We will try to capitalize on the diverse center of the Jerusalem community, what Jerusalem is and what this entire region can be, the way Lord Allenby described it," he says, citing Allenby's words from his dedication speech at the Jerusalem Center in 1933, now emblazoned on the wall at the Y: Here is a place whose atmosphere is peace, where political and religious jealousies can be forgotten and international unity fostered and developed.

Hussein calls himself a Palestinian Israeli, but says that the words don't matter much. "I am Palestinian in terms of nationality, or peoplehood. But I am also an Israeli, as a citizen, someone who is loyal to Israel, it being my only country."