Israeli foreign minister urges religious leaders to work together

Published: 2008-05-29

JERUSALEM (CNS) -- Religious leaders must work together to delegitimize extremists who use religion to spread hate, said Israeli Foreign Minister Tzipi Livni. "Extremist elements misuse religion to turn national conflicts into religious ones," she told the Forum of Leaders of Monotheistic Religions in Israel May 27. "The innocence of believers is misused by religious leaders who must be balanced by the voices of other religious leaders who have won the admiration of their faithful." The forum, which meets several times a year, is made up of the chief rabbis of Israel, the archbishops of the Holy Land and important sheiks. At the gathering, Livni said she deplored religious extremism which sends children out on terrorist missions to kill themselves and others in the name of religion. "This is the ideology of hatred and it contradicts the basic tenets of any religion," she said.

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