New at the #Vatican: Palestinian Liberation Organization –> State of Palestine.— Religion NewsService (@RNS) May 13, 2015

New at the #Vatican: Palestinian Liberation Organization –> State of Palestine. http://t.co/SrWiGbJt6t pic.twitter.com/lAQiupoTcg

— Religion NewsService (@RNS) May 13, 2015

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Vatican decision to recognize Palestine upsets Israeli government, Jewish advocacy groups – Religion News Service

JERUSALEM (RNS) The Vatican’s decision to recognize Palestine as a sovereign state on Wednesday (May 13) angered Israeli officials.

The move comes four days before the first-ever canonization of two Palestinian nuns and it solidifies the standing of Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas, who is scheduled to meet with Pope Francis at the Vatican on Saturday.

Israeli Foreign Ministry spokesman Emmanuel Nahshon told The Times of Israel that the government is “disappointed by the decision. We believe that such a decision is not conducive to bringing the Palestinians back to the negotiating table.”

Israel insists that for the Palestinians to achieve statehood, they must first end their armed struggle against Israel and recognize its right to exist as the homeland of the Jewish people.

Although the treaty codifies the Holy See’s relations with the Palestinian Authority, the Vatican has already referred to the “State of Palestine” in some official documents, including the official program handed out during Pope Francis’ Holy Land pilgrimage last year.

In recent years, the Vatican has stepped up its efforts to support Palestinian Christians in East Jerusalem, the West Bank and Gaza as their numbers have dwindled due to emigration spurred by wars and economic hardships.

A majority of Christians in the Holy Land — including Israel — are either ethnic Palestinians or live alongside them in the same towns and villages. Sisters Maria Baouardy and Mary Alphonsine Danil Ghattas, who were both Christian Arabs, are due to be canonized by Pope Francis on Sunday.

William Shomali, the auxiliary bishop of the Latin Patriarchate of Jerusalem, said the Vatican’s announcement “was not a surprise” because “the pope called President Abbas the president of the State of Palestine” during his 2014 pilgrimage to the Holy Land.

But David Harris, executive director of the AJC, the leading global Jewish advocacy organization, said the decision was “regrettable“ and “counterproductive to all who seek true peace between Israel and the Palestinians.”

“We are fully cognizant of the pope’s goodwill and desire to be a voice for peaceful coexistence, which is best served, we believe, by encouraging a resumption of Israeli-Palestinian peace talks, rather than unilateral gestures outside the framework of the negotiating table,” Harris concluded.

Abraham H. Foxman, national director of the Anti-Defamation League, said the action was “premature” and would “undermine the only real solution to the decades-old conflict, which is engaging in direct negotiations.”

YS/MG END CHABIN

Categories: Institutions, Politics

Tags: AJC, Foreign Ministry, Israel, Israeli-Palestinian peace talks, Palestine, Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas, Vatican

via Vatican decision to recognize Palestine upsets Israeli government, Jewish advocacy groups – Religion News Service.

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Netanyahu lashes out at moves to recognize an independent Palestine – CSMonitor.com

World Security Watch Terrorism & Security

Netanyahu lashes out at moves to recognize an independent Palestine

csmonitor

Editors’ Picks

Israeli Prime Minister Netanyahu called the European initiatives a ‘big mistake for peace.’ Meanwhile, a bill to codify Israel’s identity as a ‘Jewish state’ is drawing fire.

By Dan Murphy, Staff writer November 26, 2014

Jim Hollander/AP

A daily roundup of terrorism and security issues.

For years, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has paid lip service to the idea of two states for two peoples in the Holy Land. But recently, he and members of his government have been lashing out at recognition of independent Palestine, with one senior diplomat saying that a Palestinian state would be a “terror-ocracy.”

In October, Sweden recognized an independent Palestine, and the European Union postponed a vote on the question yesterday. MPs in the UK, Ireland, and Spain have also voted for recognition of Palestine in the past six weeks, and it appears that the rest of Western Europe is not far behind.

via Netanyahu lashes out at moves to recognize an independent Palestine – CSMonitor.com.

This pressed for your right to know: In U.N. Speech, Noam Chomsky Blasts United States for Supporting Israel, Blocking Palestinian State | Democracy Now!

In U.N. Speech, Noam Chomsky Blasts United States for Supporting Israel, Blocking Palestinian State | Democracy Now!.

AMY GOODMAN: Professor Noam Chomsky, speaking last Tuesday in the hall of the U.N. General Assembly before about 800 people, ambassadors and the public alike. The event was hosted by the U.N. Committee on the Exercise of the Inalienable Rights of the Palestinian People. After he spoke, I interviewed him in front of the audience. We’ll play highlights after break.

********* Video Interview and  Full Transcript  >>>>   here

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this pressed: Flash – Israel chides Swedish PM over Palestinian state – France 24

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu speaks following a meeting at the Knesset in Jerusalem on July 16, 2014

via Flash – Israel chides Swedish PM over Palestinian state – France 24.

Palestinian Christians

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Palestinian Christians are Palestinians who belong to one of a number of Christian denominations in Israel and the Palestinian territories, including Oriental Orthodoxy, Anglican, Eastern Orthodoxy, Catholic (Eastern and Western rites), Protestant, and others. In both the local dialect of Palestinian Arabic and in classical or modern standard Arabic, Christians are called Nasrani (a derivative of the Arabic word for Nazareth, al-Nasira) or Masihi (a derivative of Arabic word Masih, meaning “Messiah“).^[1] In Hebrew, they are called Notzri (also spelt Notsri), which means “Nazarene”.

Today, Christians comprise less than 4% of the Palestinian population of Israel and the Palestinian territories – approximately 8% of the Arab population of the West Bank, less than 1% in the Gaza Strip, and nearly 10% of the Arab population in Israel.^[2] According to official British Mandatory estimates, Palestine’s Christian population in 1922 comprised 9.5% of the total population (10.8% of the Palestinian population), and 7.9% in 1946.^[3] The Palestinian Christian population greatly decreased from 1948 to 1967. A large number fled or were expelled from the area during the 1948 Arab–Israeli War, and a small number left during Jordanian control of the West Bank for economic reasons. Since 1967, the Palestinian Christian population has increased in excess of the continued emigration.^[4]

Worldwide, there are nearly one million Palestinian Christians in these territories as well as in the Palestinian diaspora, comprising over 10% of the world’s total Palestinian population. Palestinian Christians live primarily in Arab states surrounding historic Palestine and in the diaspora, particularly in South America, Europe and North America.

Demographics and denominations

In 2009, there were an estimated 50,000 Christians in the Palestinian territories, mostly in the West Bank, with about 3,000 in the Gaza Strip.^[5] Of the total Christian population of 154,000 in Israel, about 80% are Arabs, many of whom also self-identify as Palestinian.^[5] The majority (56%) of Palestinian Christians live in the Palestinian diaspora.^[6]

According to the CIA World Factbook, as of 2013, the population statistics on Palestinian and related Arab-Israeli Christians are as follows:^[7][8][9]

Population group	Christian population	% Christian
West Bank*	214,000	8
Gaza Strip	12,000	0.7
Arab Christians in Israel**	123,000	10
Non-Arab Christians in Israel	29,000	0.4
Total Arab Christians	349,000	6.0
Total Christians (including non-Arabs)	378,000	3.0
* The figure includes Samaritans and other unspecified minorities.[dubious – discuss]**Arab Christians in Israel do not necessarily identify as Palestinian.

Around 50% of Palestinian Christians belong to the Orthodox Church of Jerusalem, one of the 16 churches of Eastern Orthodoxy. This community has also been known as the Arab Orthodox Christians. There are also Maronites, Melkite-Eastern Catholics, Jacobites, Chaldeans, Roman Catholics (locally known as Latins), Syriac Catholics, Orthodox Copts, Catholic Copts, Armenian Orthodox, Armenian Catholic, Quakers (Friends Society), Methodists, Presbyterians, Anglicans (Episcopal), Lutherans, Evangelicals, Pentecostals, Nazarene, Assemblies of God, Baptists and other Protestants; in addition to small groups of Jehovah’s Witnesses, Mormons and others.

The Orthodox Patriarch of Jerusalem, Theófilos III, is the leader of the Palestinian and Jordanian Orthodox Church of Jerusalem, but Israel has refused to recognize his appointment.^[10] If confirmed, he would replace Patriarch Irenaios (in office from 2001), whose status within the church became disputed after a term surrounded by controversy and scandal given that he sold Palestinian property to Israeli Orthodox Jews.^[11] Archbishop Theodosios (Hanna) of Sebastia is the highest ranking Palestinian clergyman in the Orthodox Patriarchate of Jerusalem.

The Latin Patriarch of Jerusalem, Fouad Twal, is the leader of the Roman Catholics in Jerusalem, Palestine, Jordan, Israel and Cyprus. The Anglican Bishop in Jerusalem is Suheil Dawani,^[12] who replaced Bishop Riah Abou Al Assal. Elias Chacour, a Palestinian refugee, of the Melkite Eastern Catholic Church is Archbishop of Haifa, Acre and the Galilee. Bishop Dr. Munib Younan is the president of the Lutheran World Federation and the Bishop of the Evangelical Lutheran Church in Jordan and the Holy Land (ELCJHL).

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