The Pope, Palestine and papal politics
Pope Benedict XVI's appointment of Archbishop Fouad Twal as the new Latin Patriarch of Jerusalem to succeed recently retired Archbishop Michael Sabbah - after 21 years in that position - signals a significant change of course by the Vatican in its relations with the Jewish State.
Archbishop Twal becomes the second Palestinian Arab to be named - after Archbishop Sabbah - as head of the Roman Catholic Church in Jerusalem.
However, their lineage and political heritage Palestinians have markedly different routes.
Archbishop Sabbah was born in Western Palestine in Nazareth in 1933 - and spending his entire life growing in that part of Palestine that witnessed the political struggle by the Jews that had begun in 1917 to restore the Jewish national home in Palestine - and culminated in the birth of Israel in 1948 at only 17% of Palestinian Territory.
Archbishop Twal was born in Eastern Palestine in Madaba, in 1940 - that grow in that part of Palestine in which Jewish rights to settle or constitute their National Home were postponed or withheld - culminating in the Mandatory Power - United Kingdom — the granting of independence in 77% of Palestine in 1946 for the total Palestinian Arab population living there - today called Jordan.
The appointment of Archbishop Twal be seen as an attempt by the Pope to heal the severe fracture in relations between Israel and the Vatican that had sunk to its lowest point ever by the end of 2007.
In November 2007 a former envoy to the Holy See in Jerusalem - Monsignor Pietro Sambri - complained that relations with Israel had been better before a historic agreement signed between the Holy See and Israel in 1993 - which recognizes the State of Israel 45 years after its establishment. Sambri Bishop listed a number of complaints - the failure to ease travel restrictions for Catholic clerics, threatened taxes on the Church and the state of the expropriation of Church property.
Their complaints were mild in the face of what was to come when the Archbishop Sabbah delivered the Christmas message on December 19, 2007 questioning the legitimacy of Israel to exist as a Jewish state:
"In recent times there has been talk about creating" religious "States in this land. But in this land, which is holy to three religions and two peoples, religious States can not be established because it would preclude or in an inferior position the believers of other religions … [Leaders] must know that the holiness of this land is not to the exclusion of one or other of the religions, but in the ability of each religion, with all their differences, to welcome, respect and love all who inhabit this land. "
The Archbishop did not address his appeal to the Palestinian Authority's Basic Law declares that "Islam is the official religion of Palestine" and calls for 450,000 Jews to be expelled from the West Bank. He was not sending his message to Jordan, whose Constitution declares that "Islam is the religion of the State" and where Jews are not allowed to live.
The Archbishop was blatantly taking the right of return of millions of Palestinian Arabs - mostly Muslim - and their descendants in the State of Israel - Israel.
This demand has been without war cry of the Palestine Liberation Organization and the Arab League for the past 40 years and has destroyed any prospect of America, Russia, the European Union and the United Nations - the Quartet - to create a new Arab State between Israel and Jordan.
The Vatican was silent in the face of the Archbishop of partisan antagonism towards - and criticism - Israel Vatican, despite the supposed non-political, expressed in Article 11 (2) of the 1993 Agreement:
"The Holy See, while in all cases the right to exercise their moral and spiritual teaching-office, deems it opportune to recall that, due to its nature, was solemnly committed to remaining a stranger to all merely temporal conflicts, which principle applies specifically to disputed territories and borders unstable. "
Archbisop Twal notify the appointment of the Vatican is now ready to fulfill this agreement.
The repair of bridges - do not break down - has been the hall mark of Archbishop Twal's career as a major diplomatic envoys from the Vatican. Began in 1976 with his appointment as charge d'affaires in Honduras in Central America and from there to the Vatican from 1982-1985, where he was responsible for 19 speaking African countries in the Secretariat of State. Egypt, Germany, Peru and Tunisia were signs of the road map to his appointment in 2005 as Coadjutor Archbishop of Jerusalem.
Archbishop Twal www.cutodia.org said in an interview June 22 that: "If you want to play Jews, Muslims, Christians, Jordanians, Palestinians, Cypriots, Europeans all together .. then you have to consider each comma "
In the same interview he said: "Maybe I let journalists into politics."
However, he is still alive to the need to involve Jordan in the peace process, telling Radio Vatican on June 21:
"Most of our priests, nuns, families are the schools in Jordan. We have a link to Jordan … "
The Pope - who is visiting Australia this week for World Youth Day might not be aware that another Catholic with the name of Benedict - Australia's 16th Prime Minister Joseph Benedict Chifley - once said:
"Do not try to make love to a woman by kicking in the shins"
The Pope has appointed in Jerusalem said the universality of this message. Regular newspaper columns devoted to the critique of patriarchal Israel now become mere historical footnotes.
The last Pope to bear the name of Pope Benedict - Benedict XV - Jews enthusiastically endorsed the right to reconstitute their national home in what was then Palestine, where he told Zionist leader Nahum Sokolov in 1917 to an audience:
"Nineteen years ago, one hundred Rome destroyed his homeland and trying to rebuild, which seeks a path leading through Rome … If this is the will of Divine Providence, this is what the Almighty desires. "
The papal message which is to be hoped that now permeate the relations between Israel and the Vatican. It has been a long time coming, but can only be seen as a positive development in a region where the bad news is usually the norm.
