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Hmmm, interfaith outreach. Mayb esomething has changed. here is what happened ten years ago, exerpted from MEMRI
http://www.memri.org/bin/articles.cgi?Area=sr&ID=SR00398

The Meeting between the Sheik of Al-Azhar and the Chief Rabbi of Israel

The Sheik of Al-Azhar, Muhammad Sayyid Tantawi, considered to be one of the leading religious authorities in Sunni Islam, met with the Chief Rabbi of Israel, Rabbi Israel Lau, in Cairo on December 15, 1997. This documents contains some of the ensuing discussion in the Arab media about this meeting and Tantawi’s response to the criticism directed against him.

Statements by Sheik of Al-Azhar, Muhammad Sayyid Tantawi
Following are excerpts from Sheik Tantawi’s interview with the ‘Al-Jazira’ TV Channel from Qatar:

Question:“Why didn’t such a meeting take place in the past?  Why did the former Sheik of Al-Azhar refuse to hold such a meeting, but you agreed?”
Tantawi: “By doing what I did I followed the way of the Prophet [Muhammad] who met with the Jews and held a dialogue with them… The Prophet’s stance, which is my own stance as well, was that anyone who avoids meeting with the enemies in order to counter their dubious claims and stick fingers into their eyes, is a coward…

Question: “What is your reply to the Israeli journalist, Shahar Ilan, who wrote in the Ha-Aretz newspaper about this meeting?  He claims that the rabbi won the important battle over the heart of Islam, when he met with the Sheik of Al-Azhar?”
Tantawi: “Reality refutes it. I did not ask to meet with the rabbi; he was the one who asked to meet me and when he left the meeting, his face looked like his behind… This journalist did not attend the meeting and, therefore, he is a liar.”

Question: “Is there any benefit from these kinds of meetings?”
Tantawi: “Of course.  On the personal level, I attacked him, and proved to him that Islam is the religion of truth.”

Question: “What is your position regarding the religious ruling from 1966 by the Islamic Research Center that forbids meeting with the rabbis of the Jews?”
Tantawi: “I have the right to oppose this. I think that whoever refuses to meet the enemy in order to slap him on the face is a coward, as long as the meeting in question serves Islam. I met with him in order to answer his dubious claims and tell him that Jerusalem is Arab.”

“When he [Rabbi Lau] said to me: ‘In our holy book Jerusalem is mentioned five hundred times,’ I answered: ‘And our book [The Koran] also—more than one-third of it deals with the Israelites, exposes their false claims, their atrocities, and the punishments Allah imposed on them for their oppression and wrong doing.’ All this I told him.”
Al-Mussawar, December 26, 1997

“My animosity towards the normalization of relations [with Israel] is greater than that of others. I’ve been fighting normalization for over thirty years. This is proved by the dissertation that I wrote in 1966 entitled ‘The Israelites in the Koran and Suna [Following the way of the Prophet]’. In this dissertation I discussed their dark history, their ways of deceiving Islam and Muslims, their atrocities as depicted by the Koran, their false claims and the ways in which they were answered by the Koran, the punishments Allah imposed on them, and the stages of the Zionist invasion into Palestine.”

Comment by Ben Plonie on 7/31/08 at 1:54 pm

No doubt. Classic case of man bites dog.

Comment by Brad A. Greenberg on 7/31/08 at 1:58 pm

Just to underline the point, the Sheik I quoted was being answering the critics accusing him of being a liberal just because he even met and spoke to the Rabbi.

Comment by Ben Plonie on 8/03/08 at 1:59 am

And what do the comments of one sheikh have to do with the outreach by the Keeper of Mecca and Medina, or whatever his holy titles are.

Sure, there are haters (do you see yourself in them?), but try to give some credit to the people who are reaching out. 

Read the account by Rabbi Rosen, listen to the interview with Rabbi Waskow. 

They were there.

Comment by The Web Guy on 8/03/08 at 2:32 am

Excuse me for living, but kindly point out the hate you detect in me. I certainly give credit to Rabbi Israel Lau, Chief Rabbi of the government of the Jewish State who actually had a claim to representing the Jewish people in some authoritative capacity, who likewise met with a cleric. My post was a reaction to the visit by the actual person that Rabbi Lau met, and required no interpretation by me. Not trying to be pessimistic here, but it seems the situation has deteriorated so that Al Quaeda want to kill the Saudi king as well for this conference. Note that the Saudi monarch is not personally a cleric either, so that this is a basically a meeting of organizational politicians and not religious leaders at all. It would not surprise me to learn that Abdullah was operating under the influence of an extreme American wedgie.

I likewise give credit to the current Chief Rabbi of Israel; according to your IHT link “In Israel, Chief Rabbi Yona Metzger welcomed Abdullah’s call”. But of course Rabbi Metzger was not invited to the conference. Instead, “the American Jewish Committee’s international director of interreligious affairs” was there although he represents no one as the AJC is an interest group and not a grass-roots or elected body. I’m not putting him down and I thnk he acquitted himself well, but what he is is symbolic of the value of the meeting.

At your recommendation, i listened to the interview with Rabbi Waskow. I do not share his enthusiasm for the reason that he bases his excellent adventure on the fact that he and another rabbi he was with could explain that they support the State of Israel but consider the Israel ‘occupation’ as an abomination. That is exactly backwards for a religious conference. That is like calling yourself a Lieberman Democrat. For one thing that is not representative of the positions of most Jews, and it is does not represent a Jewish position. Why not use the spiriti of dialog to explain and educate others to the Jewish position. It is telling that the program originally included a representative of Neturei Karta. If Judaism is an earthly religion, Neturei Karta is from MArs and ‘Renewal’ is from Venus. That confirms for us that politics was far more important than religion.

Speaking of symbolism, the conference was not held in Saudi Arabia. I know that Rabbi Rosen intimated that a future meeting could be held there, but Jews are not permitted to step foot on the sacred soil by law, and any Christian workers are at risk and must stay behind high walls. Spain on the other hand is kosher as it is Andalusia, the former Moslem colony in Europe.

Comment by Ben Plonie on 8/03/08 at 4:06 am

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