The leader of the U.S. House of Representatives, Speaker Nancy Pelosi, toured Jerusalem holy sites Saturday alongside a congressional delegation that included Democratic Rep. Keith Ellison, the first Muslim elected to Congress.

The tour was part of the congressional delegation's first full day in Jerusalem, the first stop on their fact-finding trip to the Middle East. The group arrived Friday.

Flanked by security guards, Pelosi and the delegation toured the Church of the Holy Sepulcher, where Christians believe Jesus' body was buried, in Jerusalem's Old City. They also visited the Western Wall, the holiest site in Judaism, where Jews have gathered for centuries to pray.

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The group looked like any another busload of American tourists visiting the region's holy sights on a warm Jerusalem spring day - but with security guards wearing earpieces to move the delegation along.

Ellison said he hoped to visit the compound above the Western Wall known as the Temple Mount to Jews and the Noble Sanctuary to Muslims. The compound, the site of the biblical temples as well as the third-holiest site in Islam, is one of the main points of friction between Israel and the Palestinians in the Middle East conflict.

"I haven't seen it yet, but I hope to, I'm really looking forward to it," Ellison said of the compound, which is also home to the Dome of Rock shrine.

Ellison said his presence - as a Muslim - on the trip sent a message to Israelis and Palestinians that people can come together.

"Reconciliation is possible," he said.

Pelosi arrived in Israel on Friday and planned to visit Syria, a country the Bush administration has shunned, on her second fact-finding trip to the Middle East since she took over in January.

Pelosi's repeat trip to the Middle East indicates she has no intention of letting the White House have the sole province on foreign policy. She has already forced legislation through the House that would order all combat troops out of Iraq by September 2008, a measure that resembles a similar measure approved by the Democratic-run Senate.

The Bush administration has mostly refused to engage Syria diplomatically because of its ties to terrorist networks. U.S. officials held their first direct, high-level contact with Syrian representatives in years this month when they met with officials from several Middle East countries in Baghdad to discuss Iraq.

Others traveling with Pelosi include Rep. Tom Lantos, the Democratic chairman of the House Foreign Affairs Committee.

The House has adjourned for a two-week spring break.

The group planned to meet with Prime Minister Ehud Olmert, and to travel to the West Bank to meet with Palestinian Authority Chairman Mahmoud Abbas, said Ellison's spokesman, Rick Jauert.

The speaker plans to address the Knesset on Sunday in what will be her first address to a foreign government legislature and as the highest ranking American woman to speak before the Knesset, according to Pelosi's office.

She is expected to discuss America's commitment to Israel and the challenges facing the two nations in the Middle East, according to a statement.

In late January, Pelosi led a delegation of House members to Iraq, Afghanistan, Israel and other neighboring countries.

The January trip to Baghdad came just days after the president asked Congress in his State of the Union address to give his revised war strategy a chance to work. Bush is sending more than 21,500 additional combat troops, plus thousands of other support troops, to Iraq in a bid to tamp down on sectarian attacks and provide enough security to hasten reconstruction efforts.