Inside Saint Catherine Monastery in South Sinai, on one of the snowy winter nights, a mysterious death occurs for the monk in charge of the monastery library and its rare manuscripts. As the investigation begins, the quiet religious spot turns into a chase scene to reach the causes of the accident and learn the perpetrator and its goals.
And before engaging in an exciting adventure to uncover the scenes of the accident, the Egyptian author, poet and scriptwriter Haitham Dabur writes one sentence that is sufficient to ignite the reader's passion, sharpening his senses to focus on each upcoming line and knowing the secret of the "Cross of Moses": "The information on which the novel is based is correct ... The names, characters, events and details of The author's imagination, and any pure coincidence.
The novel takes place after the popular uprising in Egypt in 2011, when the country witnessed fundamental political and social changes and transformations. From the death of Monk Pavlos, the adventure begins, as the investigation team summons photographer Ahmed Bahy, who previously visited the monastery and collected a friendship with the late monk to help reveal the details of the incident.
Bahey escapes from the grip of investigators with the help of Ruth, a researcher at the Environmental Research Center of the University of the Suez Canal, and they follow together the details of the last days of Monk Pavlos before joined by Abu Imran, the chief of the Jabaliya tribe who have been involved in the protection and service of the monastery since ancient times.
Events follow and the adventure extends to the flanks of St. Catherine Monastery, Muadamah, where the skulls of the departing monks accumulate, passing through the inflamed bush tree, and reaching the Al-Amiri Mosque and the orchards surrounding the monastery, so that the reader finds himself on a journey of exploration of the landmarks and details of the place, and with incursion in every corner the hero raises philosophical questions about the truth History, the ways in which it is recorded and transmitted, and the extent of its truthfulness or falsehood that it holds novels and stories.
Parallel to the main line of the novel, In Search of the Assassin, the author gives more excitement to the work by planting marginal stories from different times going on in the orbit of St. Catherine with no direct link to the monk's accident, but with the development of events and the end of the adventure approaching, these stories converge to draw a clearer picture of the history The place and its surroundings.
The novel ends with the solution of the mystery, but it does not depart the reader’s conscience without giving him the curiosity to investigate the history of the monastery of St. Catherine and get to know more about its residents, or perhaps prepare for a close visit to it.
The name chosen by the author for his novel, "The Cross of Moses", published by Dar Al-Shorouk in 344 bears a religious and historical significance, as it combined the symbol of Christianity with the Prophet of Judaism on the land of Sinai with its special place in history and heavenly religions.