Brussels, 10/01/2005 (Agence Europe) - 150 rabbis and imams from around the world met for the First World Congress of Imams and Rabbis for Peace on 3-6 January in Brussels where they adopted a joint declaration calling for mutual understanding between the two communities. Participants also decided to set up a joint standing committee that would act as an observatory on racist and anti-Semitic acts throughout the world. Alain Michel the president for the secular "Hommes de parole", was behind this unique event. This inter-religious meeting constituted "initial action" for greater understanding between the two communities. The next congress is expected to take place at the end of 2005 in Jerusalem, Seville or Jordan.
In their final declaration, participants made commitments to "working to end the bloodshed and attacks against innocent human beings". They are calling on "political leaders of all the different peoples to work for fair and lasting peaceful solutions on the planet, especially in the Holy Land". They are calling on all Jewish and Muslim religious leaders to "regularly address their communities with sermons and messages on the importance of inter-religious respect and respect for human life in all circumstances". They made commitments to "continue the common quest for human rights, for all, women and all peoples, without which no peace would be possible".
The joint standing committee set up buy the congress will be composed on ten members - four Jewish and four Muslim representatives, as well as two members of the Hommes de Parole foundation, which would in principle be the HQ of the committee. It role would be to help implement commitments taken and "regularly propose an initiatives programme". Alain Michel said that the committee would be a means of allowing them to speak out against this "silence of complicity".
As regretted in certain press conferences, the declaration does not contain any firm condemnation of acts of terrorism committed "in the name of God". However, during an opening session of the congress, a number of participants firmly denounced the instrumentalisation of religion by insisting on the need to combat this phenomenon. This regrettable "omission" was due to the need to find a consensus, explained Alain Michel, who requested that "condemnation of terrorist acts committed in the name of god were included in the declaration later on. The Israeli-Palestinian conflicts was the subject of a lot of debate during the congress. They strove to go beyond the political aspects and highlight the importance of distinguishing the political and religious conflicts., explained the participants at the press conference. Eli Khan the Israeli rabbi declared that the Israel and Palestinian conflict was not a conflict between Judaism and Islam. He regretted that the religious discourse was currently perceived as a discourse that produced hatred.