Muslim dignitaries visit Auschwitz to pay respects Quote:
In a bid to fight anti-Semitism and bridge cultural rifts, a large delegation of Muslim dignitaries visited Auschwitz in Poland on Tuesday to pay tribute to the millions of Jews and others who were systematically killed in the Holocaust.
The group of some 150 people included representatives from Morocco, Jordan, Turkey and Iraq, as well as rabbis, Holocaust survivors and Christian representatives. Several European dignitaries also were part of the group, including the former German chancellor Gerhard Schroeder.
"Muslims have to stand up with Jewish friends because in Europe, anti-Semitism is rising. And where there is anti-Semitism, Islamophobia is not far away," said British Mufti Abduljalil Sajid.
Sajid said he knew of the Holocaust from books and movies but that it was his first visit to Auschwitz. "I wanted to see it with my own eyes — and teach others about the evil of hate," he said. "This should never happen again, to anybody."
Israel Meir Lau, a former chief rabbi of Israel and himself a Holocaust survivor, said he was happy that such a large number of Muslim leaders were seeking to deepen their understanding of the Holocaust.
A response to Holocaust deniers
The trip was organized by UNESCO, the educational and cultural arm of the United Nations, as well as Paris City Hall and a new anti-racism group called the Aladdin Project. It comes at a time when some in the West voice unease over Islam's growing clout in the underbelly of their communities and with anti-Israel statements by political leaders such as Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad.
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My aim in posting this thread is to show that virtually any accommodation is possible between those who are who humble enough to defer to reason & pragmatism and realistic enough to recognize the counter-productivity of hate.
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Good Sires of TalkBass: I respectfully request that the dreaded 'P-word', which dareth not speaketh its name in TB OT, remain conspicuously absent from this thread of optimism for the future of tribal relations.
Thank ye.
