Church leaders return with ‘broken hearts’ after rare Gaza visit

Church leaders in Jerusalem say they have returned from a trip to Gaza with “broken hearts”, describing starving people and children not “batting an eyelid” at the sound of bombing.

“We have seen men holding out in the sun for hours in the hope of simple meal,” the Latin Patriarch, Cardinal Pierbattista Pizzaballa, told journalists.

“This is humiliation that is hard to bear when you see it with you own eyes. It is morally unacceptable and unjustifiable.”

The Greek Orthodox Patriarch, Theophilos III, said his Church would “stand in solidarity” with “the whole people of Gaza”.

The two men made a rare visit to the war-torn strip after Israeli tank fire hit the Catholic Holy Family Church in Gaza City last week, killing two women and a man.

US President Donald Trump is said to have made an angry call to Israel’s Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu about the deadly strike, which came days after an alleged attack by extremist Israeli settlers next to the ruins of an ancient church in the Christian village of Taybeh in the occupied West Bank.

Netanyahu’s office expressed deep regret for what was described as “a stray ammunition” hitting the Gaza church.

However, local Christians have questioned whether the place of worship was deliberately targeted. About 400 people have been sheltering in the compound, which is in part of Gaza City now under Israeli evacuation orders.

At the news conference, Pizzaballa noted that Christians were suffering in the same ways as other Palestinians.

“Three people died in our community, but thousands already died in Gaza,” he said.

He added that recent settler violence in Taybeh, was part of “broader phenomenon” in the West Bank which was “becoming a no-law land”.

Although Italy’s foreign ministry announced that the patriarchs had entered Gaza with 500 tonnes of aid, Pizzaballa said “not a gram” had yet been able to enter due to logistical issues.

He described the disappointment of those who came to the church hoping for handouts.

Amid some of the most severe food shortages in 21 months of war, Pizzaballa and Theophilos III said they met people “totally starved” and gave an account of the widespread destruction.

“We walked through the dust of ruins, past collapsed buildings and tents everywhere: in courtyards, alleyways, on the streets and on the beach,” Pizzaballa said at the end of his four-day visit. “Tents that have become homes for those who have lost everything.”

Last week, the two Church leaders led a delegation of foreign diplomats to Taybeh, north of Ramallah, where residents and local priests described several attacks by settlers.

The most serious was the fire stared next to the ruins of the Byzantine Church of St George.

An Israeli police statement said on Tuesday that a special investigative unit had found that “contrary to misleading reports, no damage was caused” to the church. It said the fire was limited to an adjacent open area and that arson was not yet confirmed.

However, one witness told the BBC that he saw settlers starting the blaze and others accused Israeli security forces of failing to respond to their complaints.

Villagers say extremists have seized their plots on the edge of Taybeh and regularly harass them, bringing cattle to eat their olive trees.

“What’s going on is really ridiculous and it’s driving people out as Israelis put their hands on our land,” a former mayor and co-founder of the Taybeh brewery, Daoud Khoury, told the BBC.

He said he worried that extremist settlers and an economic downturn since the start of the Gaza war would force more Christians to emigrate.

In an unusual move, the US ambassador to Israel, Mike Huckabee, also visited Taybeh on Saturday.

In a statement, he then denounced the attack by the church as “an act of terror” and demanded “harsh consequences” for those responsible.

Huckabee, who is also an evangelical pastor known for his past strong statements supporting Jewish settlements, which are seen as illegal under international law, wrote on X. “Desecrating a church, mosque or synagogue is a crime against humanity and God.”

In response to the Israeli police statement, he wrote that he had not attributed the fire to any group, that “regardless, it was crime and deserves consequences”.

At the Jerusalem press conference, Theophilos III said that the tiny Christian community must be supported to remain in Gaza, close to their holy places “full of history”.

During his trip, Pizzaballa told an Italian newspaper that a Catholic presence would stay in the territory “whatever happens”.

The two leaders reiterated calls by Pope Leo and a growing number of international leaders for a Gaza ceasefire and the release of remaining hostages held by Hamas.

“We are not against Israel,” said Pizzaballa, who is known as a supporter of interfaith dialogue. “But we need to say with frankness and clarity, that this policy of the Israeli government in Gaza is unacceptable and morally we cannot justify it.”