The Pope’s decision to declare October 7th a day of fasting is a farsighted warning on a historical level. The fast shows the world public opinion of three important facts:
- With the terrible massacre, Hamas has committed the most serious attack against the Jewish people since the Shoah;
- On October 7th, the indiscriminate violence of the Al Quassam brigades killed and kidnapped innocent civilians of different nationalities and religions, as well as committed barbarism of unheard-of ferocity against women and children documented in videos shot by the same militiamen who committed them;
- Those who aim to wipe Israel off the map (a cancer to be eradicated according to Ayatollah Khameini https://formiche.net/2024/02/khamenei-contro-israele-scrive-mayer/#content) aim to trigger a spiral of escalation in the Middle Eastern region and to rekindle anti-Semitism in many parts of the world.
The terrorist violence of Hamas and Hezbollah as well as the recent missile attacks by Iran against Israel have distanced the prospect of a Palestinian state that seemed close in the nineties. The Palestinian people should therefore have the courage to make a comprehensive political reflection on what has happened in the last 25 years.
Whatever the assessment of the reactions of the Israeli government (for example the excessive number of civilian deaths in the Gaza Strip as declared correctly by Kamala Harris), history teaches that other countries – starting with India – have chosen resolute but much less violent strategies, successfully achieving their goal.
October 7th, as a day of fasting, could be an opportunity for the vast Palestinian Catholic community to launch a new political-diplomatic path capable of reopening the Abraham Accords, ensuring, however, that this time the Palestinian question is not ignored and that the new agreements offer at the same time effective guarantees on the security of Israel today (as never happened in the past) attacked from six war fronts: Gaza, Lebanon, Yemen, Iraq, Syria and last but not least Iran.
*An Italian version of this article has been published in Italian in the newspaper Il Riformista
