The ruins of the Orthodox Church of St. Porphyry in Gaza. Credit: video screenshot/Twitter/@byPlestia
by Carlo Domenico Cristofori
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UPDATE ON OCTOBER 21, 2023
«The clear condemnation of the Israeli air attacks against the Orthodox church of San Porfirio in Gaza, with a death toll of 18, including nine children; the commitment not to fail in the “sacred and moral duty to offer assistance”, and an appeal to the international community to protect places of refuge and proclaim a humanitarian ceasefire to help the hundreds of thousands of civilians displaced in Gaza».
This is the content of a declaration by the Patriarchs and Heads of the Churches of Jerusalem, reported by Vatican News, which thus joins the condemnation expressed by the Archbishop of Canterbury Justin Welby, who arrived in Jerusalem on 19 October, the day after the explosion at the al-Ahli Anglican hospital in Gaza. With him, the heads of the Christian Churches, the Latin Patriarch of Jerusalem Cardinal Pierbattista Pizzaballa, the Custodian of the Holy Land Father Francesco Patton, the Greek Orthodox Patriarch Theophilus III and the Patriarchal Vicar of the Syriac-Catholic Church Mar Yacoub Ephrem Semaan, are gathered in prayer on the evening of Friday 20 October.
The explosions in Gaza, which caused the collapse of two church halls around dozens of refugees, including women and children who were sleeping there. This, the statement reads, “is the latest case of innocent civilians injured or killed due to rocket attacks on other shelters. These include schools and hospitals where people have taken refuge because their homes were demolished during the relentless bombing campaign waged against residential areas of Gaza over the past two weeks.”
Christian religious people, “despite the devastation”, remain committed to fulfilling their “sacred and moral duty to offer assistance, support and refuge to those civilians who turn to us in such desperate need”.
A Christian mission that will not be abandoned, “even in the face of incessant military requests” to evacuate charitable institutions and houses of worship, “because there is literally no other safe place for these innocents to turn to.”
ARTICLE PUBLISHED ON OCTOBER 20, 2023
«Eight people, according to the Palestinian authorities, died last night in an Israeli raid that hit the Greek Orthodox church of San Porfirio. The Greek Orthodox Patriarchate of Jerusalem issued a statement condemning the attack.”
This time it is the mainstream site of the Italian state TV RAI News that reports yet another massacre caused by a treacherous attack against a structure used as a refuge for displaced people in the hope that the religious nature of the place would shelter them.
But the Zionist germ of Benjamin Netanyahu seems to have a particular fury against Christian buildings, such as the Al Ahli hospital managed by the Episcopal Diocese of Jerusalem of the Anglican Church where the massacre of last October 17 took place.
In a statement on Friday, officials expressed the “strongest condemnation of the Israeli airstrike [on] its church compound in the city of Gaza,” and called the targeting of churches and the shelters they operate “a war crime that cannot be ignored.”
The Palestinian Ministry of Foreign Affairs blamed “occupation warplanes” for the explosion, saying Israeli aircraft bombed the church, which is located in the Zaytoun neighborhood of Gaza City. A woman and a girl died and “dozens of people” were injured, the ministry said in a post on X (formerly Twitter).
An unknown number of people are still under the rubble of the meeting hall, the Greek Orthodox Archdiocese of Jordan said on Facebook, citing one of the parishioners.
“No sufficiently accurate information is clearly available yet, but expectations are there will be a large number of martyrs,”the Archdiocese added.
“Archbishop Alexios appears to have been located and is alive, but we don’t know if he is injured,” the Orthodox Order of St. George said in a statement, adding that they have “no word on the condition of any other of the more than 500 people being housed at the church and monastery.”
According to the Order, “bombs hit the two church halls where the refugees, including children and babies, were sleeping. Presently, survivors are searching the rubble for other casualties.”
The Wall Street Journal reported that the Israel Defense Forces (IDF) were looking into the incident. The IDF has not commented on the matter, but has previously accused Hamas of using religious shrines as cover for its operatives.
St. Porphyrios is the oldest active church in Gaza. Originally built in the 5th century to honor the eponymous saint, the present structure was erected in the mid-1100s, during the Crusades, and renovated in the 1800s. It is located in the southern portion of Gaza City.
Conflicting reports from Gaza spoke of up to 800 Palestinians sheltering inside the church compound before the explosion. The premises are just 250 meters away from the Al-Ahli Hospital, where the Palestinians claimed hundreds had been killed and wounded in an explosion on Tuesday evening.
The hospital managed by the American Baptist Church had already been warned by the Israel Defense Forces that it was among the possible targets and therefore an evacuation had been ordered which was virtually impossible due to the high number of seriously injured people and children taking refuge there (approximately 3 thousand people in total).
On October 14th it had already been hit with minor damage to the structures. All this does not make the hypothesis of an Islamic jihad rocket exploding in flight and causing the enormous explosion credible in the slightest. Also because Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s spokesperson had published an exultant Tweet on X regarding the attack, which was then withdrawn when the gravity of the massacre became known.
Netanyahu has repeatedly demonstrated persecutory attitudes towards Christians, even preparing an appropriate law to discriminate against them as did the other Zionist Volodymyr Zelensky, president of Ukraine.
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Carlo Domenico Cristofori
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