c. 2003 Religion News Service

WASHINGTON _ Despite deep ideological differences about the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, a broad range of Christian, Muslim and Jewish leaders are urging President Bush to aggressively work toward lasting peace in the Middle East.

A group of 32 religious leaders attending a day-long Washington meeting on the conflict Tuesday (Dec. 2) said an active and sustained commitment from the United States is crucial to a lasting solution.

Their call came one day after an unofficial Israeli-Palestinian peace initiative was unveiled in Geneva. The so-called Geneva Accord attempted to spell out possible solutions to some of the most contentious issues dividing the parties.

David Neff, editor of Christianity Today, the most prominent American evangelical magazine, stressed that now is the time for U.S. action, telling a news conference the U.S. role as the world’s sole superpower places it in prime position to promote peace in the Middle East.

Imam Feisal Abdul Rauf, founder of the Asma Society, a group that promotes Muslim-American cultural understanding, said peace in the Middle East could be achieved if “the United States were to impose its moral and political leadership” on the right coalition of Middle East states.

Rauf said a solution in the Middle East is crucial to improving U.S.-Muslim relations because the Israeli-Palestinian conflict is the “No. 1 problem that sustains Muslim hatred of the United States.”

Rabbi Paul Menitoff, executive vice president of the Central Conference of American Rabbis, agreed that now is the time for the United States to fill the “leadership vacuum” in the Middle East, because people there are ready for a new life.

Neff said the Bush administration would find support in evangelical circles if he “is willing to seize this momentum, when both sides are weary of violence.”

But Neff and other speakers also said it was important to work toward achievable and realistic goals in the Middle East.

At the news conference to announce the leaders had formed a new coalition to sustain their call for U.S. action, the Rev. Mark Hanson, presiding bishop of the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America, said the interfaith group of Jews, Muslims and Christians is a “model of interfaith relations and diplomacy.”

Hanson said Tuesday’s meeting was indicative of a larger grass-roots movement, started after the Sept. 11 attacks, to create interfaith relationships on the local level.

“This is not just a symbolic gesture,” he said. The interfaith coalition will encourage further cooperation on the local level, as well as grass-roots campaigns to show Bush that the faith community supports reviving the road map to peace. The road map calls for the creation of a Palestinian state by 2005.

Hanson said he would like to meet with Bush because, as a religious leader, Hanson feels a special call to respond to the violence caused by deeply divided religious groups.

“The religious dimensions of what is so often portrayed as a political conflict are so stark when it comes to the Middle East,” he said. “If religious leaders don’t try to respond, then we have failed to respond to our calling, as I think the United States government has failed in theirs.”

DEA END GABRIEL