﻿THE VATICAN AND THE LONG ROAD TOWARDS A PALESTINIAN STATE

There are two prevailing souls in the Palestinian world at present: one incline to dialogue represented by the National Palestinian Authority (ANP) based in Ramallah, and its extremist counterpart embodied by Hamas and the Islamic Jihad in Gaza. The future of the Palestinians will be determined by the outcome of the struggle between such alternative visions of the future relationship with Israel. Whether it will be war or talks will depend on whether the frustrations accumulated in over 60 years will prevail over a peaceful solution. Otherwise it will be conflict, possibly a mass struggle (an Intifada), that will cause yet more, albeit disproportionally, deaths and suffering in both Palestinians and Israelis.



It is within this context that we have to evaluate the Vatican's decision to recognize the State of Palestine. A step that reinforces the political stance and international credibility of the ANP's current president, Abu Mazen, aka Mahmoud Abbas, as opposed to Khaled Meshal and Ismail Haniyeh from Hamas. The initiative is even more important if we consider that Israel has just voted in favor of the nth government ruled by Benjamin Netanyahu, whose approach is against any negotiated solution. The Israeli PM declared during his electoral campaign that he will never allow the creation of a Palestinian State, that Jerusalem is the capital of the Jewish State (although 37% of the population is Palestinian) and approved the construction of 900 homes for settlers in Eastern Jerusalem as the first act of his new government.



Given such a stance, any peaceful negotiation will be possible solely is the Palestinians seeking a dialogue, read the ANP, will be able to produce tangible results. The Vatican's initiative helps in this precise direction although they were not the first ones to take such a step. In November 2012 the UN's General Assembly approved Resolution 67/19 that granted Palestine a “non-member observer status”, just like the Holy See, that voted in favor.

Abu Mazen



The Vatican has now moved one more step ahead and signed a direct and global recognition of Palestine as a State whose legitimate representative is President Abu Mazen. By cutting Hamas out of the equation, Pope Francis is trying to foster a return to dialogue between the parties as underlined by his May 2014 visit to Jordan, West Bank and Israel. Even during that trip Mahmoud Abbas had been labeled by the Pontiff as “President” of the Palestinian “State”. The Pope's activism did not stop there. In June 2014 he invited Abu Mazen and Shimon Peres to Rome. A year before that a delegation from the Vatican had met with the PLO to discuss the status of the Catholic church. Pope Francis is continuing along the lines of a long standing relationship between the Vatican and the Palestinians that started back in 1994 and became official through the PLO in 2000. The entente between the Holy See and Palestine includes issues of religious freedom, jurisdiction, properties and status of the personnel employed by the Catholic Church for a total of 69 articles.



The biggest step is, of course, the signature of an agreement between the Vatican and Palestine, not just the PLO. The two sides had initially agreed to be represented by an envoy and not an ambassador. But this is a merely formal detail and such a distinction has no meaning in the Holy See's diplomatic list. Although not officially, a Palestinian diplomatic representation has been deployed at the Vatican for years. The latest ambassador appointed by Abu Mazen in August 2013 is Issa Kassissieh, a Greek Orthodox, while a Chargé d'Affaires named Ammar Nasnas has been taking care of the Rome office for quite some time. The Apostolic Nuncio in Jerusalem, instead, represents the Holy See in Palestine. In light of the recent clashes in the Occupied Territories, the Vatican has taken yet one more step: it has granted the Palestinians a building where to host their embassy right in front of the Sant'Anna gate that leads inside the Holy See. Such an initiative has a precise political meaning.



The Pope's activism is not simply a reflection of his attention for the marginalized (as are his condemnations of the Armenian genocide and capitalism) or his predilection for peace (as in Cuba or against an armed intervention in Syria), but a strategy targeted at the Middle East to protect the Christians. The PLO's secular characteristics help in this direction.





Yasser Arafat