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Papal plea for peace
Papal envoy worried by prospects
Cardinal Pio Laghi returned to Rome on June 5 after visiting the Holy Land and delivering a personal message from Pope John Paul II to Israeli and Palestinian leaders.
Cardinal Laghi, who was acting as the Pope’s personal envoy, met with Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon and Palestinian Authority President Yasser Arafat. He told a Vatican Radio audience that the two leaders received the Pope’s message respectfully, but he did not provide any further details on their reactions.
“It was necessary—not just useful—for John Paul II to make such a gesture,” Cardinal Laghi said. “The authority of the Pope has a very wide audience.” However, the cardinal—who once served as apostolic delegate in Israel—admitted that peace would come to that region only “with great difficulty.” He added: “Everyone is asking the question: How can we bring the violence to an end?”
Settlements as war crimes
Red Cross official criticizes Israeli policy
The head of the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) in Israel has charged that the establishment of Jewish settlements in occupied territories could be considered war crimes.
Rene Kosirnik said, “The policy of settlement as such in humanitarian law is a war crime.” He cited the Geneva Convention, which prohibits resettling a population in occupied territories. The Gaza Strip, West Bank, and East Jerusalem are designated by the United Nations as occupied territories.
“The transfer, the installation of population of the occupying power into the occupied territories is considered as an illegal move and qualified as a ‘grave breach’. It’s a grave breach, formally speaking, but grave breaches are equal in principle to war crimes,” Kosirnik said.
Parts of the West Bank and Gaza have been handed over to Palestinian rule since interim peace deals were implemented starting in 1994. Under the peace accords, the fate of Jewish settlements will be resolved in negotiations for a final treaty.
Meanwhile, Kosirnik said he hoped a solution could be found to a dispute over national emblems blocking Israel’s admission to the international Red Cross movement. Israel’s humanitarian relief movement, Magen David Adom, uses a Red Star of David and has therefore been barred from the Red Cross movement, which currently recognizes only the Red Cross and Red Crescent symbols. He said there was an effort being made to adopt a neutral alternative without the religious connotations of a Christian cross or Islamic crescent.