The funeral of Pope Francis was held in Vatican City on Saturday, with hundreds of thousands of mourners attending, including U.S. President Donald Trump and other world leaders.
Some 400,000 people packed St. Peter’s Square and lined the streets of Rome to bid farewell to the Argentine pontiff, who headed the Catholic Church since 2013.
More than 50 heads of state were present at the ceremony, as Trump was spotted meeting his Ukrainian counterpart Volodymyr Zelenskyy for the first time since their public clash in the White House in February.
An uncited source in the White House said that the encounter was “productive,” without further elaboration.
Zelenskyy’s bureau said that the meeting lasted for 15 minutes, posting a photo of the two men sitting face-to-face in the middle of a large hall in St. Peter's Basilica.
Israel was represented at the funeral by its ambassador to the Vatican, Yaron Sideman.
Following the pope’s death on Monday, aged 88, Israeli President Isaac Herzog eulogized him on X.
“I send my deepest condolences to the Christian world and especially the Christian communities in Israel—the Holy Land—on the loss of their great spiritual father, His Holiness Pope Francis,” the statement read.
“I truly hope that his prayers for peace in the Middle East and for the safe return of the hostages will soon be answered. May his memory continue to inspire acts of kindness, unity, and hope,” Herzog continued.
Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu eulogized Francis on Thursday, saying, “The State of Israel expresses its deepest condolences to the Catholic Church and the Catholic community worldwide at the passing of Pope Francis. May he rest in peace.”
Israel’s reaction to the pope’s death sparked controversy, after the Israeli Foreign Ministry conveyed its condolences on X, only to delete the message hours later.
“Rest in peace, Pope Francis. May his memory be a blessing,” read the deleted tweet, which contained a translation of the Hebrew-language standard phrase for a kind commemoration of a deceased person, akin to “Rest in Peace” in English.
The deletion prompted speculation that it was over Francis’s criticism of Israel in its war against Hamas in Gaza, including in November when he repeated allegations that “what is happening in Gaza has the characteristics of a genocide.”
An Israeli official on Wednesday, speaking to JNS on condition of anonymity citing diplomatic protocol, pushed back against claims that official Israel was muting its reaction to the pope’s death.
He noted that the statement by Herzog, as head of state, was the “definitive reaction.”
“The issues we had with the late pope, of blessed memory, we are not going to air out after his passing, and it didn’t prevent an Israeli acknowledgment at the highest levels of his passing,” the official said.
Argentina’s President Javier Milei attended the funeral as well, describing Francis on Thursday as “the most important Argentine in history.”
He further remarked that “Despite differences that seem minor now, it was a true honor to have known him in his kindness and wisdom.”
Before becoming president, Milei branded Francis as “the representative of the evil one” and called him a “commie.”
He was “a pope among the people, with an open heart,” striving for an open-minded Catholic Church, Cardinal Giovanni Battista Re, dean of the College of Cardinals, said in his homily, according to AFP.
The cardinal hailed the pope’s “conviction that the Church is a home for all, a home with its doors always open,” to which the massive crowd applauded.
(function(i,s,o,g,r,a,m){i['GoogleAnalyticsObject']=r;i[r]=i[r]||function(){
(i[r].q=i[r].q||[]).push(arguments)},i[r].l=1*new Date();a=s.createElement(o),
m=s.getElementsByTagName(o)[0];a.async=1;a.src=g;m.parentNode.insertBefore(a,m)
})(window,document,'script','https://www.google-analytics.com/analytics.js','ga');
ga('create', 'UA-37052883-1', 'auto');
ga('send', 'pageview');
var script = document.createElement('script'); script.src = 'https://www.googletagmanager.com/gtag/js?id=G-K6H02W22XT';
document.head.appendChild(script);
script.onload = function () {
window.dataLayer = window.dataLayer || [];
function gtag(){dataLayer.push(arguments);}
gtag('js', new Date());
gtag('config', 'G-K6H02W22XT');
gtag('event', 'page_view', {
'Topics': 'israel-at-war,usaid,humanitarian-aid,food,medicine,gaza-strip,palestinians',
'publication_date': '23/11/28',
'article_type': 'Article',
});
}
