Paris ? First lady Laura Bush, weighing in on the Middle East crisis Tuesday, condemned young Palestinian suicide bombers and grown-ups who incite them.

The former schoolteacher and librarian also called for children across the globe to be taught tolerance and a respect for life.

“A lasting victory in the war against terror depends on educating the world’s children because educated children are much more likely to embrace the values that defeat terror,” Mrs. Bush said in a speech to the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development.

Her 25-minute address and a later interview with White House reporters in her traveling party made for a striking first outing into international affairs for a woman who once hated giving speeches.

Mrs. Bush said she had no trepidation “not really” about commenting on the Middle East, though the nuances and sensitivities of the region have tripped up many an official in recent months.

“It’s so easy to empathize with families in Israel and around the world who literally would be afraid to send their children to the grocery store or the bowling alley” for fear of suicide bombers, the first lady said in the interview.

Asked if she had empathy for the other side in the Israeli-Palestinian dispute, she answered with reflexive bluntness: “Can I empathize with a mother who sends her child out to kill herself and others? No.”

After a beat, she continued to say that both Israelis and Palestinians are dying. “You have to have sympathy for both sides, and all of us in the world need to urge both of them both Palestinians and Israelis try to stop the violence and come to the table,” she said.

Aides said that, like the president, Mrs. Bush was particularly troubled by the March 29 incident outside a Jerusalem supermarket where an 18-year-old Palestinian girl, Ayat Akhras, detonated explosives strapped to her body. Akhras killed herself, 17-year-old Rachel Levy and a security guard and wounded 25 others.

She also decried last week’s bombing of a holiday parade in Kaspiisk, Russia, where 17 of the more than 40 victims were children, and the suicide bombing that killed 11 French engineers and two Pakistanis in Karachi, Pakistan.

In her more muted, formal comments to representatives of the OECD’s 30 member countries, Mrs. Bush offered education as a prescription for the hatred, hopelessness and poverty that she said are root causes of terrorism.

“First and foremost, we must teach all the world’s children to respect human life their own life, and the lives of others,” she said. “With education comes greater self-respect and respect for others. With education comes greater understanding and tolerance.”

Mrs. Bush said she was at a loss to reconcile her thesis about education and terrorism with the fact that several of the Sept. 11 suicide hijackers were university educated, including ringleader Mohammed Atta, who studied for eight years at the Technical University in Hamburg, Germany.

“I don’t think you can explain one individual’s reason for being a terrorist,” she said. “But I think, in general, if citizens are educated in countries around the world, that will help us fight terrorism.”