St. Peter & St. Paul Church, Shefa-Amr
Encyclopedia
St. Peter & St. Paul Church is located in the city of Shefa-Amr, Israel
Israel
The State of Israel is a parliamentary republic located in the Middle East, along the eastern shore of the Mediterranean Sea...

 on one of the town's peaks of the old city.
It has a high bell tower and a large purple dome which used to be blue until it was changed in the year of 2009.
Masses are conducted in the church in Arabic and because the Greek Catholic
Melkite Greek Catholic Church
The Melkite Greek Catholic Church is an Eastern Catholic Church in full communion with the Holy See as part of the worldwide Catholic Church. The Melkites, Byzantine Rite Catholics of mixed Eastern Mediterranean and Greek origin, trace their history to the early Christians of Antioch, Syria, of...

s are a majority in the city it is considered the main church of the city.

Ottoman period

The church was built by Ottoman the son of the Ottoman
Ottoman Empire
The Ottoman EmpireIt was usually referred to as the "Ottoman Empire", the "Turkish Empire", the "Ottoman Caliphate" or more commonly "Turkey" by its contemporaries...

 ruler Daher al-Omar, who made a promise to build it if his fort was finished successfully, so its history goes back to that of Otman's fort.
The walls of the church started to get weak so in 1904 the whole church was strengthened and improved. It remains standing today and is the main church of the Greek Catholic community of Shefa-'Amr.

Today

During the years 2010-2011 the church went through a major improvement process where the walls stones were cleaned and polished, old stone walls that were covered in the past with cement were revealed to get their original old shape, the dome was re-painted and air-conditioning was installed inside.

Links

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