HSI, for example, is affiliated with Hillel, an umbrella group for Jewish students--some of whom do not agree with the military methods used by Israel to deal with the Arab-Israeli conflict.

"It's definitely a difficult situation," Brody says. "In general, the Jewish population as a whole has come out in support of the state of Israel. But there were many individuals who either felt more ambivalent about Israel's role, or are against Israeli moves."

HSI members say they recognize the disagreement, and that they have tried to work to stay near the consensus opinions, while still showing active support for Israel.

"On one hand, we want to have a united front, but on the other hand, there are some real differences within the Jewish population," Brody says. ""We tried to make sure our statements reflected the opinion of the large majority."

Members of SAS and HIS say their greatest difficulty has not been within the groups, but has been in how it has presented itself to the rest of the student population.

Hamad and Yasin say bias by American media sources combined with the American government's alliance with Israel makes presenting their views more of a challenge.

"Ours is a small minority position," Yasin says. "The American public isn't exposed to all sides of the story, and that makes our starting point that much more difficult."

And Hamad says her groups' opinions are often clouded by the politics of the Arab-Israeli conflict.

"It's hard to say your opinion honestly because there are so many people who are going to interpret it as a political agenda," Hamad says. "Anything anyone does in this situation can be interpreted as political."

Bridging The Divide?

But despite the inner and outer disagreements and difficulties, Hillel's Interethnic Committee continued working to bring the separate sides together for discussion.

HSI says it has always been willing to co-sponsor discussion events, but SAS has refused to hold events directly with HSI due to ideological differences.

"HSI and SAS weren't able to come to some sort of agreement to have a joint event, which I think would have been very powerful," Perl-Rosenthal says. "That's not a reflection of a lack of dialogue but a lack of visible demonstrations of that dialogue."

Instead, a private roundtable discussion was held between about 30 members of Hillel, HIS, HSI and SAS in Adams House to discuss the events of the previous month and how they had played out on campus.