Priests call on Church to recognise Gaza ‘genocide’ at Rome protest

‘We march so that genocide, apartheid and ethnic cleansing never become normal – because every child is a child of God, with a name, not a number.’

A procession of witness including 100 priests carried a banner through Rome bearing the names of Palestinian and Lebanese children killed since Israel declared a ceasefire last October.

Priests from the UK, Ireland, South Africa and elsewhere joined the silent prayer march led by the Italian branch of the “Priests Against Genocide” network on 22 September, beginning on the Via della Conciliazione outside St Peter’s and concluding outside the headquarters of the arms company Leonardo, in the Della Vittoria district north of the Vatican.

“We march so that genocide, apartheid and ethnic cleansing never become normal – because every child is a child of God, with a name, not a number,” said Fr Peter-John Pearson, a priest of the Archdiocese of Cape Town who joined the protest. 

Others present included Archbishop Franco Moscone of Manfredonia-Vieste-San Giovanni Rotondo, in southern Italy, and the Archbishop Emeritus of Altamura, Giovanni Ricchiuti, the president of Pax Christi Italy. The network says it now has more than 2,600 members in 68 countries.

Canon Pat Browne, a priest of the Diocese of Westminster who took part, said the march was “very gentle, with a great sense of fraternity”, and that “people were joining us along the way”.

“It’s not antisemitic, it’s not anti-Israel,” he told The Tablet, insisting there was “nothing belligerent” about the march. “This is against the policy of the Netanyahu government towards the Palestinian people.”

After prayers at the Santo Spirito in Sassia church, the sanctuary of Divine Mercy, the priests walked past the Vatican carrying a shroud bearing the names of 300 children they said had been killed by Israeli forces after the ceasefires declared in Gaza and Lebanon in October last year. It follows the “Gaza Children’s Shroud” made by Italian and US churches recording the names of more than 18,000 children killed in Gaza, based on reports from its Health Ministry.

The march passed the Palestinian and Lebanese embassies to the Holy See and ended outside the headquarters of Leonardo SpA, an defence and aerospace company 30 per cent own by the Italian state, which activist accuse of supplying Israel with arms in violation of Italian and international law.

Priests Against Genocide issued an appeal to governments and civil institutions: “Suspend arms sales to Israel, apply international law, stop treating UN resolutions as optional opinions.”

They also called on Church leaders to be “sharper, more prophetic, more concrete” in their denunciation of Israeli policy because “cautious silence and diplomacy protect no one except those committing the atrocities”. 

“May this path of justice and peace in Rome be welcome, so as not to forget – through nonviolent steps and words – Gaza, the West Bank and Lebanon, and to continue denouncing the crime being committed by Israel against the Palestinian and Lebanese peoples, while calling for a difficult but always possible reconciliation,” said Archbishop Ricchiuti at the conclusion of the procession.

Canon Browne emphasised the need to identity the violence in Gaza as “ethnic cleansing” and “genocide”, referring to a statement in August from African members of Priests Against Genocide including the Archbishop of Johannesburg Cardinal Stephen Brislin, which said that “genocide must be stopped rather than mourned after the fact”. He observed that “the language of the Pope is getting much stronger”.

On 24 September, a delegation from Priests Against Genocide delivered a letter signed by 23 members of the group in the UK to the Prime Minister Andy Burnham at 10 Downing Street, following a meeting with parliamentarians the previous week.

The letter welcomed the “communicative and symbolic value” of the UK government’s measures against trade with illegal Israeli settlements in the West Bank, but warned that this “may end up shielding the government of Israel from scrutiny”.

“History suggests that only comprehensive measures – of the kind the world once applied to apartheid South Africa through boycott, divestment and sanctions – are capable of changing this situation,” the letter said.

Israel objects to ‘genocide’ charge at Vatican event

Protesters bearing Palestinian flags were removed from Croke Park during the final

Stay updated — add us as a preferred news source on Google: