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Good morning. I first visited the West Bank in 1962 and had the privilege of spending a term studying the history and sites of the area. Things were bad then. Sadly, 60 years later, as we have seen this week in Jenin the situation looks even more dire. 12 Palestinians were killed there and 120 wounded and one Israeli soldier was shot dead- whilst over in Tel Aviv a Palestinian wounded eight people in a stabling attack and was himself killed. 1962 was the time of the cold war, which I could not see ending in my lifetime-but in 1989 the Berlin Wall came down. It was the time of Apartheid, which I did not see ending without massive bloodshed, but in 1994 Nelson Mandela was peacefully elected President. But still there is no sign of peace between Israel and Palestine. In the book of Revelation those who have been killed for their faith are shown under the altar crying out ‘How long O Lord?’ How much longer will we have to wait before a real will for peace returns to the Israeli government, the Palestinian leadership and the International Community. One group of people for whom this cry is particularly urgent and poignant are members of the Parents Circle Family Forum. This is made up of family members of those killed in recent conflicts, mothers of Israeli soldiers and mothers of Palestinians teenagers. Created in 1995 it now has more than 600 bereaved members joined together in their shared grief and shared commitment to reconciliation. They go into schools and talk to pupils, offering hope for something better than the present violence. When will their conviction generate a political will for peace amongst those with political power. How much longer O Lord? This is an issue on which, for understandable reasons, people feel passionately, but whatever our political divisions the grief of a mother or sibling is the same whether they are an Israeli or a Palestinian: a son is a son is a son. Good religion involves enlarging our sympathies, letting our imagination widen out to include those whom we might instinctively exclude or at least forget- and many people would agree with the importance of this. That’s why I have always liked a prayer by an Arab Christian which asks that though we may be Israeli or Palestinian, Jew or Muslim or Christian, lets us at least keep them all together in our hearts.