Ashraf Ghorbal, the Egyptian Ambassador to the United States, said at the Temple Israel Friday night service that “what we must work for is the time when all in the Middle East can sleep without a gun under the pillow.” At a press conference before the service at the Reform synagogue, he said he come “to humanize rather than politicize the atmosphere.” Ghorbal’s appearance, believed to be the first time an Arab ambassador had spoken at a Sabbath service, was at the invitation of Rabbi Martin Zion and congregation president Judge Frederic Berman. Last month, in another first, Ghorbal addressed a meeting of the Synagogue Council of America.
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The Archive of the Jewish Telegraphic Agency includes articles published from 1923 to 2008. Archive stories reflect the journalistic standards and practices of the time they were published.