The Muslim-Jewish dialogue group he attends is small, private and unusually close-knit, says Rabbi Simkha Weintraub, a resident of Carroll Gardens, Brooklyn, who works at a Jewish agency in the city and has been active in human rights advocacy.

But even a group like Rabbi Weintraub’s, whose dozen or so members have developed a deep respect for each other, often has a tough time weathering moments of crisis in the world, the rabbi says, adding that some have chosen to skip sessions in the past or even rehearsed beforehand what they might say.

This may be one of those moments for Rabbi Weintraub’s group, which hasn’t met since the Gaza conflict began nearly two weeks ago, but is likely to meet soon.

Indeed, efforts aimed at promoting better relations between the area’s Jewish and Muslim populations are being tested as they haven’t been in years as emotions over Gaza reach a fevered pitch in both communities, according to organizers of those programs.

The conflict has also renewed suggestions by members of both communities that such efforts are “feel-good moments” at best, unlikely to change the gut feelings of participants and, therefore, limited in what they can achieve.

The picture is complicated further in that the goals, expectations and approaches of those efforts appear to differ from program to program. Many avoid any mention of the Mideast conflict, believing any discussion of the matter would lead to “gridlock,” in the words of one organizer, and that the first step is to establish common bonds. Other programs also stay clear of global issues, but for different reasons: Their focus is entirely local and geared toward building coalitions that address common problems, like hate crime, health care and education. Still other efforts are more ambitious, with organizers seeing their work as a potential model for Jewish and Muslim communities elsewhere, including the Middle East.

The raw emotions during the past few weeks emerged as Israel began bombing the Gaza Strip on Dec. 27 and launched a ground invasion of the territory last Saturday. Those actions followed the collapse of a cease-fire between Israel and Hamas, the Islamist group that has ruled Gaza since June 2007.

That was the atmosphere in which 10 college students from Long Island — five Muslim, five Jewish — found themselves during their final day of a weeklong visit to Israel.

The students traveled to Israel as part of the newly established Hamsa program, a partnership of the Suffolk Y Jewish Community Center, the Islamic Center of Long Island and several Israeli institutions. While in Israel, they visited Jewish and Muslim holy sites, participated in often-intense workshops and performed community service. They were also joined by five Israeli Jews and five Israeli Arabs, also college students.

Interviewed midway into their trip, the students offered a rosy picture of their experiences up to that point.

“There’s been less tension than I expected,” said Michele Aronson, 19, a Jewish student from Holbrook who attends Binghamton University. “Sure, there have been differences of opinion during the workshops, but we’ve been able to resolve them without too much trouble.”

Hira Ahmed, a Muslim student at Stony Brook University who hails from Woodmere, part of the largely Jewish Five Towns, said the trip’s high point “was experiencing each other’s spiritual practices.” She and others visited both the Al Aqsa Mosque and the Western Wall, a combination that “helped me understand the passion Muslims and Jews feel toward Jerusalem,” said Ahmed, 18, who had visited Israel before on another interfaith trip.

“There wasn’t a minute in Israel where there wasn’t a meaningful conversation going on,” said Kelly Alpert Vest, the Y’s director of community relations and one of Hamsa’s advisers. Vest recalled that everyone who encountered the students, from the chasidic founder of a Jewish-run soup kitchen to an Arab shopkeeper in the Old City, welcomed them with open arms.

But war broke out on the final day of their trip, threatening to halt or reverse the progress of an entire week. They spent most of that day in the home of an Israeli student, where “you could see black smoke rising” from nearby Arab villages and whiff the smell of burning tires, Vest said. Her concern, she added, was that after days in which the students shared their stories and learned to trust each other, “they might back into their little corners,” unwilling or fearful to open up.

But no such reversal took place, Vest recalled proudly. Instead, they read excerpts from an interview with Amos Oz, the Israeli author, in which he likened the region’s tensions to a fire. Those observing the fire could run away from the flames, allowing others to burn, Oz said, or they could each grab a teaspoon and help douse the blaze. Each of the American students later pledged to take at least one action in their own communities that would promote understanding and humanize the other group.

In the trip’s aftermath, the students have remained in touch with each other through the social networking site Facebook, but they’ve avoided discussing Gaza, said Ahmed, whose two best friends are Israeli.

“Our trip wasn’t about politics, and it’s still not about politics,” she said. “We relate to each other on a human level,” and although the conflict has been acknowledged, “it hasn’t been brought up.”

As for her own views, Ahmed noted that the Palestinians have suffered more civilian deaths during the conflict than the Israelis, but she added that Israelis, too, have suffered.

“They obviously fear for their security, and it’s a legitimate concern,” she said. At the same time, she declined to place blame on either Israel or Hamas for the strife, saying that blaming one side or the other lessens their humanity.

But it’s precisely the avoidance of political issues that often bothers critics of Muslim-Jewish dialogue. “These things sadly may be very nice for the participants, but when push comes to shove – and Gaza is a shove – they often become ludicrous,” said Jeffrey Wiesenfeld, an activist in right-wing circles who has served on the boards of numerous Jewish organizations. In his experience, he added, “very, very few” Muslim youngsters or adults will recognize Israel’s right to exist or criticize the terrorists.

Interestingly, Wiesenfeld’s view of such efforts sounds close to that offered by Adem Carroll, the leader of a coalition of groups called the Muslim Consultative Network. Carroll, who has helped organize dialogues in the past, now believes that any future dialogue has to address political questions “head on,” including what he called the “power differential” between American Muslims and American Jews. It’s no longer possible “to ignore those issues with any decency,” he said.

Such contentions are cynical, Vest said, adding that programs like Hamsa contribute to the breakdown of barriers. Concurring with Vest, Nazli Chaudhry, Hamsa’s advisor for the Islamic Center, said the “highlight” of the program for her “was seeing the Muslim students empathize with the Jewish students and the Jewish students empathize with the Muslim students. That went beyond our expectations for the program.”

Perhaps the most extensive effort aimed at bridging Jews and Muslims took place two months ago under the aegis of the Foundation for Ethnic Understanding, which organized a weekend of joint activities between 50 synagogues and 50 mosques across the country.

Rabbi Marc Schneier, the foundation’s president, said he believes those activities will help strengthen “the voices of reason, centrism and moderation” within Islam, which he said is fighting an internal battle. In his conversations with Muslims clerics during the past few days, several have privately told him that they condemn Hamas – views he hopes they will express publicly at some point.

Rabbi Weintraub, rabbinic director at the Jewish Board of Family and Children’s Services, said that “it’s an understatement to say that things have gotten polarized.” Some people are calling Israel “the aggressor” and “a fascist state,” while others are saying that Israel “should be allowed to do whatever it wants.” But members of his and other dialogue groups are now discussing “a third way,” he said: “ending the dance of violence and reasserting the kinship between peoples who love the same land.”

With reporting from Israel correspondent Michele Chabin in Jerusalem.