Church leader says U.S. crucial to peace in the Mideast

Los Angeles, CA, 10/10/2005
Daily News
By Alex Dobuzinskis, Staff Writer

The United States has a big role to play in establishing peace in the Middle East, where Christians are awaiting peace as eagerly as are Jews and Muslims, an Armenian church pontiff said Sunday during his visit to Southern California.
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{His Holiness Aram I, Catholicos of the Great House of Cilicia} [...] is on an official visit to California on the 10th anniversary of his ascension to the head of the Lebanon-based branch of the Armenian Apostolic Church.
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"I think we should go beyond politics in the strict sense of the word," Aram said. "The question is how can we live together."

Rabbi Yosef Kanefsky, president of the Board of Rabbis of Southern California, has a different view. [...].

"It's the folks with the weapons and the oil who are calling the shots, not the people inside the house of worship," he said.

Dr. Maher Hathout, spokesman for the Islamic Center of Southern California, said Christians living in the Middle East have an important role to play, especially in Israel.

"By virtue of their message and their long history of good relations with Muslims and the fact that (orthodox Christians) and the Muslims and Jews were victims of the Crusade(s), will give them that historical role to act as mediators for peace," he said

Note: Above are excerpts from the article. The full article appears here. Clarifications and comments by me are contained in {}. Deletions are marked by [...]. The bold emphasis is mine.