Wissam Mohamed and his mother reunited in Cairo, Egypt. (Representative pic)
A Facebook page was recently able to reconnect a mother and son who were separated for 44 years and believed the other was dead.
According to CBS News, Wissam Mohamed was born in Jordan to an Egyptian mother and Jordanian father who, at the time, were going through a divorce. Just two weeks after Mr Mohamed was born, he got sick and his father decided to tell his then-wife that the baby had died in the hospital.
"He was afraid she might take me away with her," Mr Mohamed told CBS News, adding that after his parent's divorce was final, his mother returned to Cairo, Egypt, assuming her child was dead.
Mr Mohamed said that he lived for decades, knowing very little about his mother and thinking she might be dead. However, it was only around four years ago that he came to believe that she might still be alive after lawyers said they could not locate a death certificate. Mr Mohamed travelled to Egypt a couple of times, hoping to find her, but failed.
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Then, not too long ago, one of Mr Mohamed's aunts in Jordan found some old photos of his mother, which set about a chain of events that led to his reunion with his mother. The 44-year-old told the outlet that his aunt posted the images on social media, following which one of her friends contacted an Egypt-based Facebook group called, "Missing Children".
Rami el-Gebali, an engineer who founded the Facebook page in 2015, then wrote a post explaining that Mr Mohamed was looking for his mother, accompanied by a photo of her son, and shared it online on December 6. Within 24 hours, Mr Mohamed's mother was located through the page and Mr Mohamed flew to Cairo to meet her.
According to CBS News, Mr Mohamed met his long-lost mother at the airport. "You thought I was dead?" he asked his mother as he hugged her. "They told me so," the mother told him. "I am sorry, I have been looking for you for 20 years," he said back.
Speaking to the outlet, Mr Mohamed said that he never lost hope of seeing his mother. "For the past 20 years, I've always believed that I will find her," he added.