Pope Francis
The 86-year-old pontiff declined to read a prepared speech due to a slight cold.
“A ceasefire for Israel is death,” said Michael Oren, former Israeli ambassador to the United States.
The museum director presented the pope with a letter penned by Holocaust survivors about the Hamas massacre in Israel.
“I pray for all those families that saw a day of celebration be transformed into a day of mourning,” said the pontiff.
Institutions, rabbis shared kind words with the Catholic Church leader.
‘It is so difficult to comfort a mother’s tears,’ Francis tells the delegation at the Vatican.
Religious brotherhood is a prerequisite for “global international brotherhood,” the grand imam of al-Azhar said at the conference.
Palestinian Authority leader incites church against Israel in call with pope
Mahmoud Abbas repeated the libel that the State of Israel “attacks” Christian and Muslim holy sites in Jerusalem.
“What began as one man’s opinion,” said Rabbi Marvin Hier, “would become state policy of Nazi Germany 22 years later, which led to the systematic murder of one-third of world Jewry.”
During the rare private audience, the two talked about “the importance of Holocaust research and remembrance in the Christian world,” according to a statement released by Yad Vashem.
On his way to the first-ever papal visit to Iraq, he sent “warm greetings” and prayers for Israel to be blessed with “harmony and peace.”
More than 200 researchers have applied for permission to study the millions of letters and documents of the pontiff’s papacy, which are held in the Vatican Apostolic Archives.
