Pope Francis holds Christmas calls with Palestinian Christians facing extinction in Gaza
Father Gabriel Romanelli, parish priest of the Roman Catholic Church of the Holy Family, provides communion during Christmas Eve mass at the church in the Zaytoun neighbourhood of Gaza City on 24 December 2024
Elis Gjevori reports in Middle East Eye on 25 December 2024:
Pope Francis has held nightly phone calls with Gaza’s Christians as they try to survive Israel’s ongoing military campaign during Christmas.
The nearly 15-month-long campaign has devastated the besieged territory and threatens to completely wipe out the area’s Christian heritage. The pontiff has been in regular contact with Palestinians in the region as the head of the world’s 1.4 billion Catholics becomes more open with his criticism of Israel.
In his Christmas address last week, the pontiff condemned the killing of children in Gaza by Israel as “cruelty”. “Yesterday, children have been bombed. This is cruelty; this is not war,” he said.
Earlier this year, he told the CBS network’s 60 Minutes: “I speak every night at seven to the Gaza parish… They tell me about what happens there. It’s very tough, very tough… Sometimes, they go hungry, and they tell me things. There is a lot of suffering.”
Israel dismissed the pope’s remarks as “particularly disappointing”, with a foreign ministry spokesperson accusing him of “double standards” and claiming his comments ignored the “fight against jihadist terrorism”. The spokesperson further criticised the “singling out of the Jewish state and its people”.
More than a year into Israel’s ongoing war on Gaza, for which it faces charges of genocide at the International Court of Justice (ICJ), the besieged Christian community in the enclave continues to struggle for survival.
Many have sought refuge within the ancient walls of St Porphyrius, a Greek Orthodox church in Gaza City, where an Israeli air strike last year devastated families, including one father who lost all three of his children.