I was thrilled to see the Texas Tribune story about Texas A&M University System Chancellor John Sharp’s planned announcement that A&M was going to the Middle East to open a “peace campus.”

http://www.texastribune.org/2013/10/22/texas-m-announce-plans-branch-campus-israel/

The Aggies are going to set up a branch campus in Nazareth, Israel, of all places. It’s the result of some communication between Sharp and Manuel Trajtenberg, an Israeli economist who’s had this idea of bridging the distance between his country and ours.

I’m fascinated for a personal reason. I got to spend some time in Nazareth in 2009 as part of a Rotary International Group Study Exchange team. I learned that Nazareth over the years has become a primarily Arab community. Much of the Jewish population has moved into the suburbs around Nazareth, leaving the city proper to the Arabs.

It’s also a city with some magnificent Christian antiquities, such as the Church of the Annunciation, where Scripture tells us Mary learned she would give birth to the Son of God.

Now the Aggies are going to set up a campus in this holy city, bringing modernity to a community that is steeped in ancient tradition.

The Tribune reported that Sharp visited Israel earlier and had lunch with Trajtenberg, whom the Tribune described as “an economist who has chaired the Planning and Budgeting Committee of the Council for Higher Education in Israel for about four years. In that role, Trajtenberg has worked to increase access to higher education for, among other groups, the ultra-Orthodox and Arab communities.

“’There is no major academic institution in any Arab city or town within Israel,’ he observed in an interview with the Tribune.”

The announcement hasn’t been made official just yet. Sharp, along with fellow Aggie, Gov. Rick Perry, and former Israeli Prime Minister Shimon Peres, will make it official on Wednesday.

This is a big deal for all parties concerned. Texas A&M University is establishing a tremendous foothold in a place where deep faith and bitter conflict exist in close proximity to each other.

Is there a better place than Nazareth to establish a university campus dedicated to peace?