Israel expressed “shock and profound disappointment” at the Pope’s meeting with PLO chief Yasir Arafat at the Vatican yesterday. A long and sharply worded statement by the Foreign Ministry declared that the meeting “shall now be recorded in the national memory of the State of Israel and the Jewish people.” The full statement read:
“Israel expresses its shock over the fact that Pope John Paul II has granted an audience to the man who heads the organization of murderers which stands at the center of international terrorism.
“Israel expresses profound disappointment at the fact that the audience took place in spite of appeals from numerous individuals and groups the world over urging the Pope to refrain from meeting the head of an organization that has perpetrated countless crimes against the Jewish people and against the citizens of many states. The decision of the Pope contradicts his own declaration, on January 1, 1980, in favor of peace and against violence.
“It shall now be recorded in the national memory of the State of Israel and of the Jewish people that the spiritual leader of millions of believers around the world did not recoil from meeting with the head of an organization that has written into its constitution as a central aim the annihilation of the Jewish State.
“The raising of Arafat’s status by the Pope meeting with him is a grave act also because it harms the peace process that constitutes the avowed personal wish of the Pope himself as well as the supreme aspiration at the State of Israel.”
ITALIAN PRESIDENT ALSO CRITICIZED
The statement also expressed “profound regret” at Italian President Sandro Pertini’s meeting with Arafat. It noted that “this terrorist leader is responsible for the disease of international terrorism that has spread to Italy too …. The President has bestowed a prize upon the perpetrators of terror who threaten the very foundations of democracy and moral values. This is a day when freedom and justice everywhere have been dealt a severe blow.”
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