The five-day trip between August 14 and 19 was aimed to “help effect peace between Israelis and Palestinians” but has instead ended up as a cause for several Muslim organisations calling for delegates’ “social boycott”. Their itinerary included meetings with Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert, Foreign Minister and Chief Rabbi. The meeting was a follow-up of the one held in March in New Delhi between prominent Indian Muslim intellectuals and clerics and their Israeli counterparts, along with the Chief Rabbi.

Following the trip, several Muslim organisations, including the Jamiat-Ulema-e-Hindi, the Jamaat-e-Islami, All-India Majlis-e-Mushawarat, Bharti Majlis and Milli Council, organised a protest in Delhi and some other cities against “Israeli American aggression”, calling it a sauda (a sellout) and wanting to enforce a “social boycott” of the delegates.

The organisations also held a late-night seminar and meeting on Tuesday at the Jamaat-e-Islami office in New Delhi where they termed the trip as a “betrayal” of sentiments of Indian Muslims.

“Iraq’s tragedy is recent. But Palestine is a cause burning for the last 60 years which Indian Muslims are very sentimental about and attached to. How could these people go there? Even the Palestinian Authority was angry, and these people weren’t allowed to enter the premises of the Ramallah office where Yasser Arafat is buried, or the tomb of Hazrat Ibrahim,” said Javed Habib, former leader of the All-India Babri Masjid Action Committee.

The group (led by Maulana Jameel Ilyasi, who did not go, but associates himself with the move), which is in favour of engaging Israel, asserted in an interview in Urdu daily Hindustan Express that “a historic Muslim-Jew peace accord would be signed, and the peace move would be successful. Without a solution to this problem, to talk of peace in West Asia is fazool (futile)”.

“Those protesting are also right as the amount of transparency that should have been there around the trip was not there, for which I am responsible. But Muslims must appreciate the seriousness of the situation,” said Ilyasi.

In the New Delhi meeting in March, Muslim representatives from India included Maulana Wahiduddin; Sirajuddin Qureshi (President of the India Islamic Cultural Centre); and Dr Akhtar-ul-Wasey (Director of Islamic Studies, Jamia Millia Islamia). The meeting, held at the residence of Leader of the Opposition LK Advani, created a stir in Muslim circles and those from the community present were forced to issue clarifications. On the trip to Israel, they chose to stay away.