During his four years as Pope, Francis has continually put significant barriers in the way of peace between Israelis and Palestinians, and instead strengthened Abbas’s refusal to negotiate with the Jewish State.
While the Vatican stressed the holiness of Jerusalem to “believers of all three Abrahamic religions,” Abbas referred to it as “the capital of Palestine.”
Elizabeth Hesselblad, a Swedish-born nun known for hiding Jews from the Nazis during the Holocaust, was among two new Catholic clergy members proclaimed as saints by Pope Francis on Sunday.
In a historical meeting, the leaders of the Christian world pleaded to save the remnants of Christianity in the Middle East, which has survived only in Israel.
The leaders of the Catholic and Russian Orthodox churches will meet for the first time since their schism 1,000 years ago, in order to discuss the ongoing persecution of Christians in the Middle East.
Pope Francis said several times that Jews were the “elder brothers” of Christians, repeating the words first uttered by John Paul during his historic visit to the synagogue 30 years ago.
The chief rabbi of Rome said that the papal visit is aimed at showing five decades of improving Christian-Jewish relations and interfaith harmony, at a time of global Islamic extremist violence. But he also said some recent Vatican developments “cannot be so appreciated by the Jewish community.”
Pope Francis will make his first official visit to Rome’s Great Synagogue inJanuary, the city’s Jewish community said in a statement on Tuesday. He will be the third pope to visit that venue.