Religious leaders, in letter, urge Bush to promote Middle East peace

Published: 2008-02-04

WASHINGTON (CNS) -- Two U.S. cardinals are part of an interfaith group of religious leaders who have asked President George W. Bush for his "active leadership" in achieving a peace agreement between Israel and the Palestinian territories, and for a comprehensive cease-fire covering Israel, the Gaza Strip and the West Bank. "The split in Palestinian governance between the West Bank and Gaza is incompatible with a durable peace agreement," said the letter, which was signed by Cardinal Francis E. George of Chicago, president of the U.S. bishops, and Cardinal Theodore E. McCarrick, retired archbishop of Washington. The United States should "quietly support efforts by others, possibly including Egypt and Saudi Arabia, to help form a new unified Palestinian government ... committed to rejecting violence, accepting previous agreements, and negotiating a two-state solution as the basis for peaceful coexistence between Israel and Palestine," said the Jan. 30 letter, written for the National Interreligious Leadership Initiative for Peace in the Middle East. A copy of the letter was released Feb. 4 by the Office of Media Relations of the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops.

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