Posts Tagged ‘Palestine’

War: Discerning the call to choose sides

Thursday, November 9th, 2023
war

Wars always bring pressure to canonise one side and to demonise the other. It has been no different in the war between Israel and Hamas. People both in the antagonists and in their normal allies are pressed to make a choice. To choose Israel is to see its war against Hamas as just in all Read more

Stop the war say NZ Catholic, NZ Anglican bishops and the Pope

Thursday, October 26th, 2023
stop the war

Stop the war! The war in the Holy Land must stop. Now. Please. Just stop. In a joint statement, Bishops from New Zealand’s two biggest Christian Churches – Catholic and Anglican – are begging the warring factions in the Holy Land to stop. Stop the war with the accompanying acts of violence it executes, the Read more

NZ bishops urge action to end Palestinian suffering

Monday, July 18th, 2022
Palestinian suffering

New Zealand’s Catholic bishops are deeply concerned for Palestinians who for decades “have been reduced to the status of refugees in their own homeland”. In a statement released last week, they said: “Attempts to find a lasting peace in the Holy Land that would provide security for Palestinians and the ordinary people of Israel have Read more

Vatican appears to rebuke new US West Bank settlement policy

Monday, November 25th, 2019

In what appears to be a rare public rebuke of U.S. foreign policy, the Vatican issued a statement Thursday, reaffirming its support for a two-state solution to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict and calling on Israel to reside “within the borders recognized by the international community”. ”The communique follows this week’s controversial announcement that the U.S. government is reversing Read more

Pope meets Palestine’s president

Thursday, December 6th, 2018

Pope Francis and Palestine’s president Mahmoud Abbas, who met on Monday at the Vatican, discussed a number of topics including Christian persecution, the status of Jerusalem and a two-state solution for the conflict between Israel and Palestine. The Vatican says the good relations between the Holy See and Palestine were noted during the meeting, “as Read more

Interfaith unity: Christians and Muslims attend Gaza vigil together

Thursday, April 5th, 2018

Interfaith unity has seen Orthodox Christians and Muslims in the Occupied West Bank join together in a march to remember those who were killed by Israeli forces in Gaza last month. Palestinian Orthodox Christians limited their celebrations on Palm Sunday, restricting the occasion to religious rituals to mourn the deaths of 17 Gazans killed in Read more

Jerusalem: the latest chapter in a century of colonialism

Thursday, December 14th, 2017

One hundred years ago, on 11 December 1917, the British army occupied Jerusalem. As General Allenby’s troops marched through Bab al-Khalil, launching a century of settler colonialism across Palestine, prime minister David Lloyd George heralded the city’s capture as “a Christmas present for the British people”. In a few months’ time, we mark another such Read more

The plight of Christians in Palestine

Thursday, December 14th, 2017

On 6 December, Donald Trump officially recognised Jerusalem as the capital of Israel. “It has been the capital of the Israeli people since ancient times,” said the President. “It’s undeniable, it’s just a fact.” Christians in Bethlehem responded to the news by burning photos of the American president. They held signs saying: “Jerusalem, Palestine’s heart, is not Read more

Jerusalem for all Abrahamic religions, not just one

Thursday, December 7th, 2017

Jerusalem was formally recognised by the United States (US) as the capital of Israel on Wednesday. At the same time, President Trump announced plans to eventually relocate the US Embassy to the holy city. Pope Francis responded to the change in US policy, saying he wants the “status quo” to remain. He says he is Read more

50 years of occupation by Israel – enough is enough!

Thursday, October 5th, 2017

Fifty years is a long time to endure forced suffering. Since the 1967 Arab-Israeli War when Israel captured and occupied the Palestinian territories of East Jerusalem, the remaining part of the West Bank and Gaza, the Palestinian people have lived under the heavy yoke of Israeli military occupation. According to Human Rights Watch’s Middle East Read more