2023-12-18 01:28:27
by Lorenzo Cremonesi
The army opens an investigation into the deaths of two Christian women at the Holy Family. The Pope’s appeal: «Let us not forget our brothers who suffer from conflicts»
FROM OUR CORRESPONDENT
JERUSALEM — The story still has confusing aspects. It is not clear whether the Israeli sniper first shot the mother, Nahida Khalil Anton, or her daughter Samar. However, it is known that one of her was hit while she was trying to drag the other who had just fallen to the floor towards a sheltered room. And both died while they were going to the bathrooms of the parish complex of the Holy Family: one of the few shelters that until Saturday midday were considered relatively safe in the hell of rubble, tunnels and explosions that now characterizes the northern part of Gaza. «We shouted, we begged, but the sniper kept shooting. After the two women, he hit seven other people, two of whom were seriously injured and life-threatening, but no one could help”, they say from inside the besieged Church.
A fact considered very serious by the Christian Churches of the Holy Land. So much so that the other evening the Latin Patriarchate had already released a harsh statement in which it condemned the attack without mincing words. “Before the shots we had received no alarm, no report,” we read. The patriarch himself, the recently appointed Cardinal Pierbattista Pizzaballa, has joined the chorus calling for the intervention of the international community to seek a peaceful solution to the crisis. And the Franciscans of the Custody of the Holy Land add that “this way of acting is absolutely not justifiable”. The Guardian, Francesco Patton, notes: “If you lose the value of other people’s lives, it means that you have lost the sense of your own dignity.”
The Pope dwelt on the events in Gaza yesterday in his Sunday Angelus sermon, insisting on the details. “In the Holy Family there are no terrorists, but families, children, sick and disabled people, nuns,” he exclaimed, insisting that the “sharpshooters” also damaged the convent of the Sisters of Maria Theresa and their generator, necessary for medical machinery to support patients. Interviewed by Vatican Radio, the parish priest of the church in Gaza, Gabriele Romanelli, wanted to recall that the two dead women were “very active in the local Christian community”, adding that, since the week of truce for the exchanges of prisoners and hostages between Israel and Hamas at the end of November, in recent days the Zeitun neighborhood, where the church is located, had been bombed with increasing intensity.
Israeli military spokesmen respond by explaining that they “take very seriously reports of damage to religious sites, including churches which are sacred places for Christian communities, a minority group in the Middle East.” They add that they have opened an investigation and that by mid-day on Saturday the soldiers had identified the presence of “Hamas terrorists” in the Holy Family area. According to them, they then contacted the churches, but no damage or casualties had been reported.
Among the Christian community of Bethlehem, Mitri Raheb, a 61-year-old pastor of the Evangelical Lutheran Church as well as a teacher and writer known for his positions in favor of Palestinian independence, is in daily contact with the Christians of Gaza. Yesterday he managed to speak with the Holy Family. «Over 600 people are refugees in the parish, the majority of the thousand Christians from the Strip. They lack everything, even bread and water. They are terrified, especially after the bombings against the old cathedral of San Porfirio and other Christian places which caused 24 deaths and dozens of injuries two weeks after the start of the military operations”, he explains. We ask him if he is aware of any Hamas positions or tunnels near the Holy Family. His response is lapidary: «Absolutely not. It’s a question we all ask all the time. But there is no evidence to this effect. The soldiers simply shoot at everything that moves. To date our deaths are 26, all civilians. And unfortunately they seem destined to increase.” According to him, the shots also hit the metal tanks on the roofs, depriving people of water.
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December 17, 2023 (modified December 17, 2023 | 10.28pm)
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