The Gift of Otherness

That we can fall in love with with a person of another race or religion, far from being the disaster parents and clergy make of it, is clearly a gift.
In my reading, I sometimes come across the observation that we are an outbreeding species by habit. Even if, like me, you tend to look at gifts as invitations to feel some obligation, then at least allow that our wandering lust is nature's plan.

Note: the Times reports

"The findings on Mendelian disease could be used by the major Bedouin populations in neighboring Egypt, Jordan and Saudi Arabia with similar gene mutations. But so far, Dr. Birk said, scientists in those countries have refused offers to collaborate."

but in fact, other Arab countries know they have the same problem and are doing something about it. The reported non-cooperation has to be viewed in the light of who is saying it about whom and chalked up to another interferance of politics or religion in the mission of medicine. That the helpful work now afoot is a cooperative effort of an Israeli, a Palestinian and a Bedouin is tesitmony to what is possible even in that troubled region.