Premier Menachem Begin extended a formal invitation to Pope John Paul II to visit “Eretz Israel.” At the conclusion of his speech to the Knesset yesterday, he said the Pope would be welcomed with all the dignity due his office. He recalled that the Polish both Pontiff was one of the “unfortunately few” Catholic clergymen in Poland who had helped save Jews during the Nazi occupation of that country.
The Jewish people do not forget such deeds, just as it would not forget the people of Denmark and the Danish Royal Family who saved virtually the entire Jewish population of that country from the Nazis, he said.
Begin’s invitation followed an indication by the Pope to a French Jewish delegation in Paris last week that he would like to visit the Holy Land at some time in the future.
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