Six programs relating to the seemingly unresolvable Palestinian-Israeli conflict were presented at All Souls in April and May. Five of the programs were organized by the Rev. David Robb, Minister of Adult Education. The lecture series was titled, “The Elusive Quest For Peace in The Middle East: Historic and Current Perspectives.” David outlined the focus saying, “There is a need in America for a better sense of Middle East history, culture and religions and an understanding of how our country is perceived around the world.” The speakers had varying backgrounds and associations and therefore, different points of view. The Peace Task Force organized a sixth program on the topic, which added further insights.

Imam Faisal Abdul Rauf opened the series with lectures on May 2 and 9 with the same title as his new book: What’s Right With Islam. Imam Rauf is the leader of the Masjid al Farah Mosque in New York City. Rauf is a liberal Muslim leader who works tirelessly to improve relations between the American Muslim community and other religious and social groups in our multi-cultural, democratic society. He said that traditional Islam is compatible with contemporary American life and that Islam’s values are similar. His talk stressed the positive side of integration of Muslims into American culture; he did not touch upon the potential threat of extremist Muslim groups to the nation’s security.

Monica Teragi, chair of the American Arab Anti-Discrimination Committee and Nirit Ben Ari, an Israeli woman who served in the military and lives now in the United States, shared the lectern May 16. They each said that the current policies of the Israeli government are harsh and provocative, giving as an example the gigantic wall the Israelis are constructing. “It further isolates the Palestinians and puts a brake on reconciliation,” they added. The Israeli government’s mandate to remove Israeli settlers applies only to Gaza and not to the West Bank where most of the land in question is concentrated.

On May 18, Dr. Khaled Fahmy, Professor of History in the Department of Middle Eastern Studies at N.Y.U. gave an historical overview of the entire Middle East up to the end of World War I. This included the Balfour Declaration in 1917 and the partition of Palestine. He talked about ancient civilizations such as Mesopotamia and Babylon reapportioned into mandates and protectorates by the Allies without regard to tribal or religious differences. He gave as examples: Iraq, Trans-Jordan, Syria and Saudi Arabia. This was done to further colonial interests rather than for the benefit of the region. His talk was titled, “The Israeli-Palestinian conflict: A Historical Perspective.” Professor Fahmy completed his doctorate in Modern History at Oxford and taught in the Department of Near Eastern Studies at Princeton before joining the N.Y.U. faculty. He is the author of several books and many articles on the region.

A few days later, his colleague and Chairman of the Department of Middle Eastern Studies at N.Y.U., Professor Zachary Lackman, gave a broad view of the United States role in the Middle East from the Cold War to the present.

Independently, the Peace Task Force organized an event April 18 titled, “A Report From Israel and Palestine.” The speakers were Yoram Gelman, Adjunct Professor of Economics at Lehman College and his wife, Felice, Managing Partner of SuNova Capital. The Gelmans had just returned two months before from a trip to Gaza and the West Bank. Although they had visited Israel many times over the course of thirty-five years, since they had family living there, they had never been in the occupied territories. The purpose of their trip was to see conditions there for themselves. They traveled with several other American Jews, some of them Jewish Veterans of the U.S. Civil Rights Movement, as they label themselves.

The Gelmans reported that both sides have peaceful and extremist factions. They said that the Israeli settlers doggedly hold on to the Gaza Strip and West Bank despite the Israeli government’s call for withdrawal from Gaza. They showed a filmed interview of one Palestinian who had his house torn down several times after he rebuilt it. They stressed that the American press has not given the public the full story and that the Palestinians in this territory have been abused.

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