Maurice Fischer, Israel’s Ambassador to Italy, called today on the Vatican State Secretariat to discuss details of the Pope’s visit to Christian Holy Places in Israel during his pilgrimage next month to the Holy Land. Pope Paul VI will be in Israel on January 5.
Israeli police Chief Joseph Nahmias and Teddy Kolleck, director-general of the Israeli Premier’s Office, arrived in Rome today to assist Dr. Fischer in working out the details for the Pontiff’s visit to Israel. These details as disclosed here, indicated the Pontiff would enter Israel from Jordan at the frontier near Jenin, where he will meet President Shazar. The road the Pope will use has been closed to traffic since 1948.
The Pontiff will continue on to Nazareth and visit the Cathedral of the Annunciation there. He will celebrate mass and then receive local ecclesiastical authorities in the presence of the Bishop Hakim of Nazareth. The Pope will then visit Mount Tabor and Capernaum near Lake Tiberias, the Mount of the Benediction and the northern corner of the Lake–all in Israeli territory. He will visit Mount Zion at dusk and then enter the Jordan-held Old City of Jerusalem through the Mandelbaum Gate separating it from the Israeli part of Jerusalem.
Precise details of this timetable were elaborated tonight by Dr. Fischer, Police Chief Nahmias and Mr. Kollek. The arrival of the Israeli officials and the conferences with the Secretariat touched off speculation in the Italian press about the political status of Jerusalem. However, the Israel Embassy here dismissed such comments as groundless, noting that the Pope was visiting the Israeli part of Jerusalem on his return to Jordan.
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