Gaza: Catholic monks march to the Vatican

Nearly 150 priests, men and women religious, accompanied by a bishop, marched on Tuesday September 22 to Saint Peter’s Basilica, in the Vatican, to denounce the genocide in Gaza. United within the international movement Priests Against Genocide, they notably displayed a long banner bearing the names of 300 children killed in Gaza and Lebanon. The collective now claims to have more than 2,500 members on five continents.

This mobilization is particularly symbolic. Since the start of the war, solidarity with the Palestinians has sometimes been presented as an essentially Arab or Muslim cause. However, many Christian voices are also being raised to denounce the suffering inflicted on Palestinian civilians and to demand an end to the war. In Gaza, Palestinian Muslims and Christians share the same land, the same history and, today, the same tragedy. The mobilization of these Catholic religious figures thus reminds us that the defense of the lives of Palestinians is not a matter of religious affiliation.

When priests and nuns march to the heart of the Vatican carrying the names of children killed in Gaza, the message goes beyond the political conflict: Gaza becomes a matter of universal conscience.