Jewish group: Dialogue with Muslims more urgent than ties with Vatican

A top Jewish umbrella organization in the United States is launching a campaign to initiate dialogue and cooperative efforts with the Muslim community.

The Jewish Council for Public Affairs announced the initiative as part of a bid to shift the focus from the community's recent rapprochement with Pope Benedict XVI. While restoring good ties with the Catholic Church is seen as important, especially following the fallout over the bishop who was reinstated despite his past statements denying the Holocaust.

There is a growing sense among activists and rabbis in the Jewish community that reaching out to American Muslims is a more urgent need than relations with Catholics.

The JCPA says it seeks to foster greater Jewish-Muslim cooperation in promoting civil rights, defending civil liberties, and combating terrorism. The JCPA also says it seeks to join forces with Muslims to combat anti-Semitism, xenophobia, and anti-Islamic prejudice.

"Now we must move beyond myopic focus on Jewish-Christian relations and face the real challenge of the 21st century: Jewish-Muslim dialogue," said Rabbi Marc Schneier, the head of the Foundation for Ethnic Understanding.

"The battle will be uphill, the struggle difficult, the discomfort inevitable, but Muslim leaders have the opportunity to echo the historic declaration of the Vatican's Nostra Aetate," Schneier said, referring to the Catholic Church's official repudiation of the age-old accusation of deicide against the Jews.