The Vatican's secretary of state, Cardinal Pietro Parolin, on Monday condemned the "carnage" in Gaza and said it was "unacceptable" to dismiss the death toll there as collateral damage.
Parolin was speaking to Vatican media ahead of the two-year anniversary of what he called the "inhuman and indefensible" October 7 Hamas attack inside Israel, and said he prayed for the hostages still being held.
Parolin said the genocidal war "has brought about disastrous and inhuman consequences", adding that he was struck by the daily death toll among the Palestinian population, including "so many children whose only fault seems to be having been born there".
"We risk becoming desensitised to this carnage," Parolin said in the interview, published in Italian and English.
He added: "It is unacceptable and unjustifiable to reduce human beings to mere 'collateral damage'."
He also condemned those who used the war as justification for antisemitism, which he called a "cancer", warning that "the perverse chain of hatred can only generate a spiral that leads nowhere good".
Parolin said it was "clear that the international community is, unfortunately, powerless and that the countries truly capable of exerting influence have so far failed to act to stop the ongoing massacre".
He added: "It's not enough to say that what is happening is unacceptable and then continue to allow it to happen."
Asked about US President Donald Trump's plan for peace, he said: "Any plan that includes the Palestinian people in decisions about their own future, and helps put an end to this slaughter -- releasing hostages and halting the daily killing of hundreds of people -- is to be welcomed and supported."
He also welcomed street demonstrations for Gaza across the world, saying: "It shows we are not condemned to indifference."
Pope Leo XIV has in recent months condemned the "barbarity" of the war and condemned the fact the Palestinians were being "forcibly displaced again from their lands".
The Holy See officially recognised the a Palestinian state 10 years ago.
Hamas's October 2023 attack resulted in the deaths of 1,219 people, mostly civilians, according to Israeli figures.
Israel's brutal offensive has killed at least 67,160 Palestinians, according to health ministry figures in the territory that the United Nations considers reliable.
Holy Land's top Catholic leader calls on Christians to help build bridges in the Gaza conflict
As talks got underway Monday to end the war in Gaza, the top Catholic leader in the Holy Land called on Christians in the region to be a bridge and help restore trust between Israelis and Palestinians.
Cardinal Pierbattista Pizzaballa said Christians — who make up just 1% of the population in the birthplace of Christianity — are of “no threat” to any side of the conflict and therefore are uniquely positioned to help everyone work toward a shared and peaceful postwar future. Though he has no illusions that it will be easy.
Pizzaballa, the Latin Patriarch of Jerusalem, said that cautious hope was spreading among the faithful at the one Catholic church in Gaza. It was struck by an Israeli shell in July but has continued ministering to its community and those seeking shelter in it.
“People keep dying every day out there. But at least in the air you feel something different, you hope that maybe this is going to finish,” he said.
As for Jewish and Muslim communities, the war’s devastating toll has fractured society at all levels, Pizzaballa said.
“This war made all the different issues — political, religious, economic, cultural — explode,” he said. “Now we have to rethink everything anew.”
“In this moment, you have to be very honest, very candid — the respective communities are not ready for this,” he told news agency The Associated Press in his reception hall in Jerusalem’s Old City — a shared and hotly contested holy site for Christianity, Islam and Judaism.
“The wounds are there, very painful. The suffering, the misunderstandings. So, what we have to do is to start from this very sad reality and rebuild.”
[SRC] https://www.newarab.com/news/top-vatican-diplomat-condemns-gaza-carnage
