Jews: want to fight anti-Semitism? Muslims: want to challenge islamophobia? There’s an easy way to do it: have coffee with one another.
Last week, the rabbi and imam of Duke University, did just that. Amidst the tension between Muslims and Jews caused by the violence off the coast of Israel and Gaza, their regular coffee date felt like a political act.
They typically steer their discussion away from politics not because they feel uneasy on that turf; they know that they disagree on many core issues surrounding the Israeli-Palestinian controversy and are quite comfortable with that. They are careful because they know that when political discourse becomes the dominant mode — or the only mode — of interaction something essential may be lost: empathy.
(READ more of the column in the Washington Post)