In Turkey, Islamic mystic Rumi's whirling connects even Iranians and Israeli Jews

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The headline is bad because it reduces Rumi to a single practice but the story is interesting because it shows how Rumi transcends religion.

In Turkey, Islamic mystic Rumi's whirling connects even Iranians and Israeli Jews

But despite what some may perceive as cultural appropriation by the West, it’s hard to imagine Rumi himself opposing the circulation of his ideas. One of his best-known quotes reads: “Come, come, whoever you are. Wanderer, worshiper, lover of leaving. It doesn’t matter. Ours is not a caravan of despair. Come, even if you have broken your vows a thousand times. Come, yet again, come, come.”
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He considered all humans to be manifestations of the divine and as such viewed all people as complex, spiritual, and equal beings. His teachings encourage self-observation and self-discovery as the main ways of reaching spiritual enlightenment and connecting to God.
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there is an active community of Israelis who follow Rumi and practice Sama.
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Western influence “led to certain changes within the communities,” Parciack says. “For the first time, women started appearing in Sama ceremonies… The presence in the West changed the approach toward gender. It allowed women to enter the ceremony actively while performing publicly.”
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Another member of the group adds, “When you connect with your heart everything becomes a reflection of love and you can love everything.”
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“Many people today know Sama as a dance, as a show, but it’s not. It’s a prayer, it’s the remembrance of God,” Turkish Mevlevi Dervish Osman Sariaj tells The Times of Israel.

Sariaj says the unique position whirling Dervishes put themselves in during the ceremony – holding one hand toward the sky and the other toward the ground while tilting their head sideways – reflects its meditative and religious purpose.

“All people want something from God. We also want something. But we don’t look at what he gives us. Our head position means that we don’t look up or down. The other hand is pointed down, we’re not looking at what we give others as well. We only look toward our hearts, inward,” he says, reiterating Rumi’s saying: “Only from the heart can you touch the sky.”
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Sufism in Jewish tradition
A Jewish sect that was active in Egypt in the 12th-13th centuries and was led by Abraham Maimonides, the son of noted sage Maimonides, is believed to have integrated Islamic Sufi ideas of the time into their practices.
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According to Dr. Michael Laitman, founder and president of the Bnei Baruch Kabbalah Education & Research Institute, the connection between Sufism and Jewish mysticism is biblical.

“Both Sufism and the wisdom of the Kabbalah speak about the same thing. They both originated from Abraham. He taught Sufism as spiritual teachings to his eldest son Ishmael and the wisdom of Kabbalah to his other son, Isaac. But both practices are connected, they don’t contradict each other,” Laitman says.

Today, these ideas are carried on by a group of academics, rabbis, and sheiks who call themselves “Derech Avraham” (Abraham’s Journey). The group promotes interfaith dialogue based on common ideas and practices from Judaism and Islam. Its goal, according to its website, is to “facilitate a reunion of Isaac & Ishmael – the nations of the Middle East – that will build a highway to bless the nations.”
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as Rumi put it: “Your task is not to seek for love, but merely to seek and find all the barriers within yourself that you have built against it.”