Top church leaders visited Gaza on Friday after its only Catholic church was struck by an Israeli shell the day before, an attack that killed three people and wounded 10, including a priest who had developed a close friendship with the late Pope Francis.
The strike drew condemnation from both the current Pope and U.S. President Donald Trump, and prompted a statement of regret from Israel, which said it was a mistake.
Since ending a ceasefire in March, Israel has regularly launched deadly strikes across Gaza against what it says are Hamas militants, frequently killing women and children. Strikes killed 18 people overnight, health officials said Friday.
Pope Leo XVI, meanwhile, renewed his call for negotiations to end the 21-month war during a Friday phone call with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, the Vatican said.
Church leaders organize aid, evacuations
The religious delegation to Gaza included two patriarchs from Jerusalem — Latin Patriarch Cardinal Pierbattista Pizzaballa and Greek Orthodox Patriarch Theophilos III. The rare visit was intended to express the “shared pastoral solicitude of the Churches of the Holy Land,” a statement said.
“We want to express our solidarity with our people, especially after the tragedy yesterday,” Pizzaballa told a CBC News freelance journalist on Friday, adding that the patriarchs are appealing to the international community for a ceasefire.
Israel has heavily restricted access to Gaza since the start of the war, though church leaders have entered on previous occasions, usually to mark major holidays.
The delegation visited the Holy Family Catholic Church, whose compound was damaged in the shelling. They were also organizing convoys carrying hundreds of tonnes of food, medical supplies and other equipment to the territory — which experts say has been pushed to the brink of famine by Israel’s war and military offensive — and the evacuation of those wounded in the church strike.
“This visit is a rejection to what has taken place and a rejection of everything happening in this war,” 60-year-old Elias Al-Jalda, a Christian activist in Gaza, told CBC News.
In a call with Netanyahu, Pope Leo “expressed again his concern over the dramatic humanitarian situation for the population in Gaza, with children, the elderly and the sick paying the most heartbreaking price,” the Vatican said in a statement.
An Israeli official, who spoke anonymously because they were not authorized to speak on the record, confirmed that Netanyahu had placed the call and said the Vatican’s account was accurate.
In an earlier statement, the Pope had “repeated his intentions to do everything possible to stop the useless slaughter of innocent people,” and condemned “the unjustifiable attack” on the church.
Almost every night since the start of the war in Gaza, the Holy Family Church in Gaza City would get a call from Pope Francis, including just two days before his death. Father Gabriel Romanelli tells The National’s Adrienne Arsenault about the final phone call and the impact of the pontiff’s extraordinary outreach.
The Vatican said the Pope had also received an update on the condition of Rev. Gabriel Romanelli, the resident priest at the church, who was lightly wounded. The priest had regularly spoken by phone with Pope Francis, who died in April, telling the pontiff about the struggles faced by civilians in Gaza.
Netanyahu released a statement Thursday saying Israel “deeply regrets that a stray ammunition hit Gaza’s Holy Family Church.” The Israeli military said it was still investigating.
‘We are unable to get them out’
Israel has repeatedly struck schools, shelters, hospitals and other civilian buildings, accusing Hamas militants of sheltering inside and blaming them for civilian deaths. Palestinians say nowhere has felt safe since Israel launched its offensive in response to Hamas’s Oct. 7, 2023, attack.
Israeli strikes killed at least 18 Palestinians overnight and into Friday, including a strike on a home in the southern city of Khan Younis that killed four members of the same family, according to morgue records at Nasser Hospital, which received the bodies.
The Associated Press footage of the aftermath of the strike showed people searching for remains.
“They are still under the rubble,” said Belal Abu Sahloul, a relative of those killed. “Until now we are unable to get them out, even in small pieces.”
At the hospital, a mother could be seen holding the hand of her daughter, who had been killed in one of the other strikes and placed in a body bag. Nearly 18,000 Palestinian children have been killed since the start of the war, according to Gaza’s Health Ministry.
Israel’s military said it was “operating to dismantle Hamas military capabilities” and that it takes “feasible precautions to mitigate civilian harm.”
3 more killed seeking aid: health officials
Nasser Hospital said another three people were killed while heading toward an aid site run by the Gaza Humanitarian Foundation (GHF), an Israeli-backed American contractor. A spokesperson for the foundation said there was no violence at its sites overnight and that crowds were “docile.”
Since the group’s operations began in late May, hundreds of Palestinians have been killed in shootings by Israeli soldiers while on roads heading to the sites, according to witnesses and health officials. GHF’s four sites are all in military-controlled zones, and the Israeli military has said its troops have only fired warning shots to control crowds. There was no comment from the military on the latest deaths.
The Gaza war was triggered when Palestinian Hamas militants attacked Israel on Oct. 7, 2023, killing 1,200 people and taking 251 hostages, according to Israeli tallies. Fifty hostages are still being held, with less than half till believed to be still alive.
Israel’s retaliatory offensive has killed over 58,600 Palestinians, according to Gaza’s Health Ministry, while displacing almost the entire population of more than two million and causing a hunger crisis.
