[Reader-list] Spat between Israel and Vetican

[taraprakash]

(From NY Times)

Israel Condemns Vatican's 'Concentration Camp' Remarks. 
By RACHEL DONADIO. ROME. Tensions rose between the Vatican and Israel on Thursday after Israel condemned a high-ranking Vatican official for comparing the Gaza Strip to 'a concentration camp. 

Look at the conditions in Gaza: more and more, it resembles a big concentration camp,' Cardinal Renato Martino, the president of the Council for Justice and Peace, said in an interview published Wednesday in an online publication. 

He defended his comments in the center-left daily newspaper La Repubblica on Thursday. While noting that Hamas rockets into Israel were 'certainly not sugared almonds,' he called the situation in Gaza 'horrific' and said conditions there went 'against human dignity. 

Israel on Thursday harshly condemned the cardinal's use of World War Two imagery. We are astounded that a spiritual dignitary would have such words, that are so far removed from truth and dignity,' said Yigal Palmor, a spokesman for the Israeli Foreign Ministry. 

He added that it was 'shocking to hear the vocabulary of Hamas propaganda coming from a member of the church. But he denied that it would cause a diplomatic crisis. It 'doesn't change the nature of relations between Israel and the Holy See,' Mr. Palmor said. 

The Vatican sought to downplay the cardinal's remarks. The Vatican spokesman, Rev. Federico Lombardi, called Cardinal Martino's choice of words 'inopportune,' and said they created 'irritation and confusion' more than illumination. 

While calling the cardinal 'an authoritative person,' Rev. Lombardi added that 'The more authoritative voice and line would be that of the pope. 

Indeed, the cardinal's remarks overshadowed an important discourse that Pope Benedict XVI delivered on Thursday, in which he called for a ceasefire in Gaza and decried 'a renewed outbreak of violence provoking immense damage and suffering for the civilian population. 

Once again I would repeat that military options are no solution and that violence, wherever it comes from and whatever form it takes, must be firmly condemned,' he told diplomats accredited to the Vatican. 

In unusually direct remarks, the pope looked ahead to 'crucial elections' coming up in the Middle East and called for dialogue between Israel and Syria, the 'strengthening of institutions' in Lebanon and a 'negotiated solution' to 'the controversy surrounding' Iran's nuclear program. 

Israel's ambassador to the Vatican, Mordechay Lewy, said events Gaza had 'no connection' to plans underway for Benedict to visit Israel, the West Bank and Jordan this spring. The Vatican has not yet officially announced the trip. 

In the past, some Jews have seen the Vatican's approach as more sympathetic to Palestinian suffering than Israeli security. Mr. Lewy called the pope's speech 'equivocal. 

The language and the expectations of the Holy Father and the scope of his interests are different from those of a politician,' Mr. Lewy said. In practical politics, I'm sure Israel wouldn't have existed if we would have acted without any force.