Aceasefire in the Middle East can promote friendships between Muslim and Jewish communities in the UK, women from both faiths have said at a gathering organised to show that divisions are not “unbridgeable” (Kaya Burgess writes).

More than 40 Jewish and Muslim women came together in west London at an event where that most British of diplomatic tools, a “shared cup of tea”, was hailed as a way to promote a peace “made of small gestures”.

Those present were told the conflict that followed the October 7 attacks can no longer be the “elephant in the room” between Muslims and Jews, who must have “difficult conversations” about the war and its fallout.

Denise Joseph, a Jewish accountant, said: “I know it’s not easy for everybody, but it’s really uplifting to be here with you all. The last two years have been seismic in terms of our relationships.”

The women, who made “friendship bags” for each other, form part of Nisa-Nashim, a network founded in 2015 which brings Jewish and Muslim women together. Lindsay Simmonds, a research fellow at the London School of Jewish Studies, said: “We are not friends because one of us is a Muslim and one a Jew, nor despite this fact, but because we like each other ... we find in each other a kindred spirit.”

Zaza Elsheikh, a Muslim doctor and lawyer who now works as a mediator, said of the need to openly discuss the Middle East conflict: “Your tummy might be in knots [but] if we’re to have any hope of spreading this antidote to the polarisation that exists out there, we are going to have to start here, with us.”

The women lit candles at the Al Manaar mosque in north Kensington in memory of those who died on October 7, in the conflict that followed and in the attack on a Manchester synagogue this month.

Amanda Bowman, a Jewish woman, said in a reading that she hoped for “a peace made of small gestures: a shared cup of tea, a child’s laughter, the courage to listen before replying”.

Simmonds said there was an opportunity to “reach across what may seem like unbridgeable divides”. However, Laura Marks, a co-founder of Nisa-Nashim, cautioned: “Now we have the ceasefire, it doesn’t mean we have peace yet.”