POPE BENEDICT XVI’s reference yesterday in Jerusalem to the shared roots of Judaism, Christianity and Islam was made amid inescapable political tension between them on the future of Israeli-Palestinian relations. His message of peace and dialogue between the three great monotheistic religions is both welcome and necessary. But the Grand Mufti of Jerusalem, the most senior Palestinian Muslim cleric, followed it immediately by giving the pope a letter saying peace “can only be achieved with the end of occupation and with our Palestinian people regaining their freedom”.
Earlier President Shimon Peres of Israel looked forward to “a year of regional peace”. And Pope Benedict himself, on landing in Israel on Monday, reiterated the Vatican’s support for a two-state solution to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict “so that both peoples may live in peace in a homeland of their own, with secure and internationally recognised borders”.
All this is difficult terrain for the new Israeli prime minister, Binyamin Netanyahu, who opposes a two-state settlement and next week faces a crucial meeting with President Barack Obama in Washington. In advance of that Mr Obama has been making it clear he strongly supports such a settlement and wants to see it facilitated by a relaxation of Israeli barriers to free movement in and out of the West Bank and Gaza. Mr Obama is to spell out his approach next month in Egypt and badly needs evidence that Israel is willing to support him. The stage is being set for a serious battle of wills and interests between Israel and the US on these issues.
Pope Benedict and other religious leaders can have an indirect influence on this political process by pressing home their commitment to inter-faith dialogue and by setting an example of better understanding. On that benchmark the pope’s record with his Israeli hosts was decidedly mixed on this occasion. As a German churchman and theologian who was forcibly recruited into Hitler Youth during his teenage years there was disappointment among many Israelis that he did not use this occasion to apologise for the Holocaust and for the papacy’s role in it. They found his reference to the disaster too abstract and ill-focused.
And yet he and his predecessor Pope John Paul II have dealt with this question comprehensively on previous occasions; they should not be expected to retrace that ground again and again. Pope Benedict’s five-day visit to Jerusalem, Bethlehem and Nazareth which continues today should be judged in the round and on a longer run.