This story is part of RNS’ Love Thy Neighbor series. You can read all the stories here.
(RNS) — In the months after Oct. 7, 2023, Shariq Ghani, the 44-year-old Muslim executive director of the Houston-based civic multifaith nonprofit Bridges, began hosting regular, emergency meetings with Jewish and Muslim community partners in the city.
Interfaith relations in Texas — like the rest of the country — were tense. As the war in Gaza progressed, reported incidents of anti-Muslim and anti-Jewish hate crimes, discrimination and harassment skyrocketed across the state and the U.S.
While such polarization over politics, culture and religion isn’t a new issue facing interfaith collaboration, Ghani said he’s seen it exacerbated since the 2016 elections, and again after the Oct. 7 Hamas attacks on Israel, and the ensuing Gaza and Iran wars. He wanted Bridges — founded by Muslim Texans 16 years ago amid rising prejudice after 9/11 — to work with its partners to find ways of maintaining dialogue when old models were failing and fewer people were reaching across political, religious and cultural barriers, he told RNS. Formerly called the Minaret Foundation, it had led “common ground” efforts like advocacy for child welfare, food security and religious freedom.
While these efforts are still a priority, Ghani said he found the group needed to pivot to talking directly about the “divisive topics, the elephants in the room,” in order for the partners to keep working together constructively.
Shariq Ghani. (Photo courtesy of Bridges)
A first case study came in December 2025, when Bridges brought together Jews and Muslims to talk about the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. It was Bridges’ Muslim-Jewish Christmas gathering, or what Ghani called “an event for people with nothing else to do that day.” Traditionally centered on fellowship, they changed course to foster hard dialogue on the conflict.
Several months and discussions later, Bridges’ approach to tackling hard topics straightforwardly seems to be working — despite discomfort. After the conversations, participants said they were surprised by what they found out and their ability to work together afterward.
For that first Christmas discussion, dialogue participants were placed in small groups to discuss how their faith, lived experiences and understanding of history shaped their views. They also considered how xenophobia toward Palestinians and Israe …