Shimon Peres, then Minister of Foreign Affairs, congratulating the composer in his Jerusalem office (January 1994) after she had been awarded the ACUM Prize for the Encouragement of Composition for her cantata "Like Two Branches". The amazing text of the Bedouin poetess Al-Khansa which served as the basis for this work so impressed Shimon Peres that he came to the conclusion: the cantata should most definitely be performed at the ceremony marking a peace agreement with Saudi Arabia which will surely be signed some time in the future…