Continuing and Urgent

Muslim-Jewish Relations

While the Muslim population in America is growing both in number and visibility - the number, according to most observers, is between 4 and 6 million there remains an undercurrent of anxiety between members of this diverse group and other groups in America. With respect to relations between Jews and Muslims, events in the international arena have informed a "new interreligious frontier" for the relationship. The signing on September 13,1993 of the declaration of Principles between Israel and the PLO, and cooperative efforts between the organized Jewish community and Muslim leadership concerning Bosnia, created opportunities for further activity.

Additionally, there has been a growing awareness on the part of some Arab American and American Muslim groups, such as the Arab-American Institute and the National Association of Arab Americans, and of some Jewish communities, of the potential for cooperative and coalitional activity around issues of common concern on the domestic legislative and judicial agenda. In the second session of the 103rd Congress, Jewish groups, including the NJCRAC, worked with Muslim American organizations in advocacy on behalf of religious-accommodation legislation and for incorporation of a religious exemption to the gay-rights bill. CRCs in communities around the country will be called upon to replicate these activities on the local level.

With respect to questions calling for dialogue between the two communities, the Jewish community relations field will find significant differences between the history of the dialogue between Jews and Christians on the national level, in which the issues were rooted almost completely and exclusively in theology, and the developing patterns in the Muslim-Jewish dialogue, in which the discussion is often political in nature. The field will be called upon to develop approaches responsive to new challenges.

AIDS

AIDS is now the third leading cause of death among adults ages 25-44. The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) report that more than 339,250 Americans have been diagnosed with AIDS and more than 204,390 Americans have died. It is estimated that me in 250 people in the United States is infected with the HIV virus. U.S. immigration policy prohibits HIV-positive individuals from entering the country. Currently, permission to enter the U.S. is granted on a case-by-case basis. Virtually all private and voluntary public health organizations in the United States, as well as the CDC and the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, have agreed that HIV is not a communicable disease of public health significance and have recommended that HIV be removed from the list of excludable diseases. Nonetheless, as of March 1994, the Department of Health and Human Services has not removed the HIV virus from the list of "dangerous contagious diseases" for which aliens are excludable from this country. The NJCRAC supports the removal of HIV from the immigration restriction list. The Jewish community relations field supports federal and state legislation that includes anti-discrimination and confidentiality provisions and increased federal funding for research, voluntary blood testing, counseling and other relevant services to all affected populations; and is opposed to mandatory HIV testing.

(NOTE: See NJCRAC Policy Statement on AIDS in Joint Program Plan for 1988-89.)