As Secular Peace Effort Stutters in Israel, Religious Mediators Hope to Step In The inclusion of an Islamist party in Israel’s government has spurred a group of imams and rabbis hoping to build a religious-based peace movement. Rabbi Michael Melchior at his home in Jerusalem. He made an unlikely friend in Sheikh Abdullah Nimr Darwish, a founder of the Islamist party Raam.Credit...Amit Elkayam for The New York Times July 4, 2021, 5:00 a.m. ET JERUSALEM — The rabbi stood before the grave of the imam, weeping as he gave his eulogy. In life, Rabbi Michael Melchior said, Sheikh Abdullah Nimr Darwish had promised him that he would never leave his side. In death, the sheikh had left him feeling as bereft as an orphan.