Addressing the American Jewish Committee on the day the Israeli-Palestinian agreement was signed in Cairo, Vice President Al Gore said the event was a cause for rejoicing.
But Gore took a cautiously optimistic tone overall, noting that the journey toward Middle East peace could be a difficult one.
“We rejoice and believe that if today’s signing is our guide, we are emboldened to hope that there will be peace in the Middle East,” Gore told several hundred participants at the opening of the group’s 88th annual meeting.
“In the Middle East, we must temper these feelings of hope with an understanding that rough days” lie ahead, the vice president added.
In remarks at a luncheon session, in which Gore discussed both the Cairo signing and the historic elections in South Africa, he also spoke out against hate crimes in the United States. He commented that AJCommittee has been a force for “transcending differences” in American society.
Also speaking at Wednesday’s lunch was civil rights leader James Farmer, founding director of the Congress of Racial Equality, who received AJCommittee’s Public Service Award to mark his work for civil rights and social justice.
The veteran civil rights activist, introduced by former longtime AJCommittee Washington representative Hyman Bookbinder, spoke passionately about the cooperation between blacks and Jews during the civil rights movement of the 1950s and 1960s.
In remarks apparently referring to the controversies surrounding Louis Farrakhan and the Nation of Islam, Farmer said, “There are some obscene individuals who would blind the minds of our people to the facts” of the strong black-Jewish alliance “with their bitter lies and deceit, attacking our strongest allies in the struggle.”
The meeting, lasting from Wednesday through Friday, was also scheduled to include a special presentation at the U.S. Holocaust Memorial Museum late Wednesday afternoon to director Steven Spielberg for his film “Schindler’s List.”
Secretary of State Warren Christopher was scheduled to address the group Thursday night, upon his expected return from the Middle East.
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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.
