Jewish and Palestinian women and
men -- equally -- gathered In
The city's largest newspaper published
back-to-back articles about the weekend:
Regional
conference will bring together Jews, Palestinians
Interfaith service will kick off
event
Palestinian-Jewish Dialogue
Weekend
Interfaith
prayers for peace open conference
It was the Second Midwest
Palestinian-Jewish Dialogue Weekend, described at http://traubman.igc.org/louisville.htm
.
And its coming somehow inspired The Temple to plan a
stunning Shabbat "Service for Peace" with standing-room-only
attendance by Muslims, Christians and Jews whose youth and adults spoke from
the pulpit in Arabic, English and Hebrew prayers and blessings for one another.
They now hope to make the Sabbath "Service for
Peace" an annual tradition each Friday before the High Holidays.
This Dialogue has made its way to the heartland of
A good part of the reason for these
successes is a handful of Arabs and Jews there who call themselves
Togetherfor2states -- http://www.togetherfor2states.org/ .
Two who shepherd the group are Bashar
Masri ( BBMasri@aol.com )
and wife, Debbie, and Mark Isaacs ( legacyhms@aol.com ) and spouse,
Sally.
In 2004, they brought across the ocean 23
Palestinian and Israeli youth musicians.
They performed 11 concerts -- Making Harmony -- for
5,000 people, opening a lot of minds and hearts and setting a high standard of
for all of us.
People still remember the parting words of Amir, the young Palestinian drummer from
You can see photos
of the 2005 Dialogue Weekend activities at:
Here are how some
responses of participants who came from
"I learned a lot about myself
and the process and met a lot of great people. I hope to grow to be a better
listener."
"I was deeply moved by what we
started in
"I treasure the openness and
trust that allowed us to really hear each other's stories as our own!"
"My horoscope for yesterday:
'You act as a buffer between warring parties. It's an unusual position for you
to be in, as your usual modus operandi is to take a side." How about
that! Next step will be to find folks who are interested in a
dialogue group. . ."drop drop drop drop
Ocean."
The story of this fine weekend
is at http://traubman.igc.org/louisville.htm
.
Help bring people together where you live.
It means the world.