Patriarch Sabbah: “When you celebrate Christmas, remember that in Bethlehem, in Jerusalem, life is not a Christmas life. It is not the blessed life of the new redeemed humanity. The song of the Angels is far away.”

The Vatican issued a statement insisting that it is “absolutely necessary to reactivate direct dialogue” between Israelis and Palestinians “to achieve a two-state solution.”

The United States has dithered on establishing any policy to help bring an end to a conflict now in its eighth decade.

“Violence is also in the language, in the political decisions, in the conditions of life under which the Gaza population has been living many years.”

What’s going on in the Holy Land—and what’s at the root of the problem? Why should Catholics care?

The humanitarian needs were already huge without Covid and without the aggression,” Bassam Nasser, who leads the Gaza office for Catholic Relief Services, told America on May 20. “You can imagine, when you add those two challenges, the crisis will become huge.”