U.S. Copts Association

Doha opens one of regions first scholarly centers dedicated to interfaith dialogue.
DOHA - More than a dozen rabbis, including two from Israel, were in attendance this week as this conservative Muslim sheikdom opened one of the Gulf’s first scholarly centers dedicated to interfaith dialogue.

Muslim, Christian and Jewish scholars in met in the heartland of conservative Islam, as part of a broader push by Arab governments for interfaith dialogue.

The talks were not entirely smooth, and politics and disputes over the Palestinian issue did inevitably intrude, said Rabbi David James Lazar, leader of a synagogue in Tel Aviv.

Yet, the benefits for him were huge, he said — especially the ability to make personal connections with Arabs and Muslims “who otherwise I would have no contact with.”

“For some it’s their first chance ever to hear, not only an Israeli but to hear a Jewish rabbi speak … And so one of my responses is trying to tell them the story of the Jewish people, which often they have not heard. The Holocaust,” he said.

“I hear their story as well,” he said. “It’s an exchange of stories.”

Another attendee, Rabbi Herschel Gluck, chairman of the Muslim Jewish Forum in Britain, commended Qatar for “being brave” by holding the conference.

Some Qataris consider this and other changes made by Sheik Hamad bin Jassem bin Jabr al Thani as progressive and credit him for social and economic reforms since 1995.

Two months ago, the country also allowed the opening of its first-ever Catholic church. It has had low-level ties with Israel through a trade office for 12 years although it does not recognize Israel, and recently also invited Israeli Foreign Minister Tzipi Livni to speak at a conference on democracy.

Ibrahim al-Nuaimi, the director of the interfaith center sponsored by the ruling family, said the goal is to “promote joint studies of academics from three faiths to foster understanding and peace.”

Cardinal Jean-Louis Tauran, who heads Vatican’s council for inter-religious dialogue and attended the conference, praised Qatar’s efforts to include Jews.

“As religious leaders, let us promote a sound pedagogy of peace, which is taught in the family, mosques, synagogues and churches,” Tauran said.

Efforts at interfaith dialogue got one of their biggest boosts when Saudi Arabia’s King Abdullah met with Pope Benedict XVI last November at the Vatican.

In March, the Saudi king then made an impassioned plea for dialogue among Muslims, Christians and Jews.

Lazar, the Tel Aviv rabbi, said he is no politician but will carry his warm impressions from the conference back to his students and synagogue — as he hopes Muslim clerics will, too.