POPE CALLS FOR TWO-STATE SOLUTION TO THE ISRAELI-PALESTINIAN CONFLICT
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| Pope Francis waves as he leads the "Urbi et Orbi" (to the city and the world) message from the balcony overlooking St. Peter's Square at the Vatican on December 25, 2017. |
Christians leaders in Jerusalem have voiced fear over the repercussions
of America's recognition of the city as Israel's capital, asking that
international law be respected in the interest of maintaining peace.
Pope Francis uses his Christmas message to call for "peaceful
coexistence" of Palestine and Israel as future states "within
mutually agreed and internationally recognised borders."
Pope Francis used his Christmas message on Monday to call for a
negotiated two-state solution to end the Palestinian-Israeli conflict, after US
President Donald Trump stoked regional tensions with his recognition of
Jerusalem as Israel's capital.
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"Let us pray that the will to resume dialogue may prevail between
the parties and that a negotiated solution can finally be reached, one that
would allow the peaceful coexistence of two states within mutually agreed and
internationally recognised borders," Francis said.
It was the second time that the pope has spoken out publicly about
Jerusalem since Trump's unilateral decision on December 6. On that day, Francis
called for the city's "status quo" to be respected, lest new tensions
in the Middle East further inflame world conflicts.
Meanwhile, According to Fr. David Neuhaus, a priest in the Latin
Patriarchate of Jerusalem and former Parochial Vicar for Hebrew-speaking
Catholics in the city, the first reaction to the decision was fear.
“You touch Jerusalem, things explode,” he said, explaining that for
people on the ground, there are three primary concerns over the move, the first
of which is “how many people are going to die?To what extent is there going
to be violence and loss of life?”
Over 120 countries defied Trump last week and voted in favour of a
United Nations General Assembly resolution, calling for the US to drop its
unilateral move on the status of Jerusalem.
This ‘two-state’ solution is a vanishing possibility on the ground, but
it is also an increasingly impossible political solution. The Israelis are not
going to accept it and even the slightest moves towards Palestinian statehood,
like recent recognition at the UN, are met with outright rejection by Israel.
The fact is that no Israeli government could or would agree to withdrawal to
the 1967 borders. And Netanyahu has now explicitly ruled this out.
Even more tragically engagement with the two state solution has damaged
the Palestinian cause. The plane is always pursued through US sponsored
negotiations, always involves Palestinian compromises and ends in undermining
the standing of Palestinian representatives among the Palestinians themselves.
The Oslo peace process undermined and divided the Palestinian
resistance. And all the while, indeed as a consequence, the Israeli state
continued to expand the settlement programmed.
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