Israeli strikes in Gaza, West Bank leave dozens dead

TAYBEH, West Bank: Top church leaders in the Holy Land asserted Monday that Israeli authorities “facilitate and enable” the presence of Israeli settlers who have intensified attacks in recent weeks on the only entirely Christian Palestinian village remaining in the occupied West Bank.

Speaking in the village, Taybeh, on a rare solidarity visit, Greek Orthodox Patriarch Theophilos III and Latin Patriarch Pierbattista Pizzaballa denounced an incident last week when settlers set fires near the community’s church. They said that Israeli authorities failed to respond to emergency calls for help from the Palestinian community.

In a separate statement, the patriarchs and heads of churches in Jerusalem demanded an investigation into the incident and called for the settlers to be held accountable by the Israeli authorities, “who facilitate and enable their presence around Taybeh.”

The church leaders also said that settlers had brought their cattle to graze on Palestinian lands in the area, set fire to several homes last month and put up a sign reading “there is no future for you here.”

Israel’s military did not immediately respond to the allegations.

Pizzaballa, the top Catholic cleric in Jerusalem, said he believed the West Bank was becoming a lawless area.

“The only law (in the West Bank) is that of power, of those who have the force, not the law. We must work for the law to return to this part of the country, so anyone can appeal to the law to enforce their rights,” Pizzaballa told reporters.

He and Theophilos prayed together in the church of St. George, whose religious site dates back centuries, adjacent to the area where settlers ignited the fires.

The statement from the heads of churches comes as Palestinians report a surge of settler violence. On Sunday, hundreds descended on the village of Al-Mazraa a-Sharqiya, south of Taybeh, for the funeral of two young men killed during a settler attack on Friday.

The Christian community in Israel and the Palestinian territories has dwindled as a percentage of the overall population over the decades, with experts citing lower birthrates and emigration by people fleeing conflict or seeking better opportunities abroad. Christians now make up a tiny percentage of the population.

LONDON: The Palestinian Authority’s President Mahmoud Abbas reaffirmed that Hamas will not take part in governing the coastal enclave of the post-war Gaza Strip during a meeting with former UK Prime Minister Tony Blair in Amman.

Abbas said Hamas must surrender its weapons to the PA and participate in political actions aligned with the principles of the Palestine Liberation Organization. Neither Hamas nor Islamic Jihad is part of the PLO, and both groups have long rejected calls to join what Palestinians consider their sole political representative since the 1960s.

Abbas said that Hamas must recognize that in the Palestinian territories, there should be “one system, one law, and one legitimate weapon,” during his meeting on Sunday evening with Blair, who served as the special envoy of the Quartet on the Middle East from 2007 to 2015.

Hamas has controlled the Gaza Strip since 2007 after armed clashes with PA forces, which resulted in the deaths of nearly 700 Palestinians, according to an official tally. Since then, it has engaged in several conflicts with Israel, the most recent being the Oct. 7, 2023, attacks, which resulted in the deaths and abduction of several hundred people and prompted an ongoing Israeli war on Gaza, which has killed over 58,000 Palestinians.

Abbas called for an immediate ceasefire in Gaza, the release of Israeli hostages in exchange for Palestinian prisoners, and the flow of humanitarian aid.

He stressed the need for a two-state solution and the importance of the French-Saudi-sponsored conference, scheduled for the end of July in New York, to gain support for establishing a Palestinian state.