Years ago, when Elie Wiesel was awarded the Nobel Prize for Peace, he made a statement regarding the mental atmosphere in Germany during the Nazi rule. His remark has stayed with me ever since. Mr. Wiesel said that the opposite of love is not hate, but apathy.
And so, one cold December evening when I was invited to attend a small gathering to hear a rabbi and a Muslim from Gaza discuss the troubles in their respective homelands, I remembered that comment. I was tempted to stay home, thinking I wouldn't be missed. And it was so cold. . . .
But the reports of violence had increased, and the failed peace talks at Camp David had been well documented, and I, like so many others, had been praying for that part of the world.
