31.12.2024
Archbishop Calls for End to Hostilities and Release of Hostages in Gaza and Israel
Statement by Archbishop Michael Jackson following news of further damage to Al Ahli Arab Hospital in Gaza City.
As 2024 closes and as 2025 opens, it is with deep sorrow that we witness the hostilities in Gaza and Israel in particular as they enter their third calendar year.
My appeal is for the immediate cessation of all hostilities and the release of all hostages. Children, women and older people have borne the brunt of war in a way that most of us never expected or envisaged. My plea is that negotiations, which have suffered from the whiplash of start/stop, stop/start, be brought urgently to a compassionate and positive conclusion.
The most recent news, direct from the Diocese of Jerusalem this morning, of more destruction of Al Ahli Arab Hospital in Gaza on December 29, combined with news of attacks on other hospitals and hospital personnel in Gaza in particular, fills us with alarm and grief. The creation and maintenance of the humanitarian corridor of response and care in Gaza is essential to the provision of an humane 2025 in the whole region.
In recent days I have been contacted by healthcare professionals in Ireland in the wake of the abduction of Dr Hussam Abu Safiyah, Medical Director of Kamal Adwan Hospital. I stand with those who have contacted me and call on all leaders to raise their voices nationally and internationally to call for Dr Abu Safiyah’s release and demand that medical facilities, staff and patients are protected by all parties to this war, according to international law.
The United Dioceses of Dublin and Glendalough stands with the Diocese of Jerusalem and the Middle East through The Epiphany Agreement, signed by myself and the then Archbishop of Jerusalem Suheil Dawani in January 2016 and continued today with Archbishop Hosam Naoum. The Diocese of Jerusalem continues to offer support and intervention to everyone who needs help and relief. Once again I thank all who have subscribed to the Shine a Light initiative which has attained its goal of one quarter of a million Euro.
It is in our call for divine mercy in human action that I call for peace as I wish those of you who can do so to have a happy New Year.
+Michael Jackson