Haaretz
Elul 24, 5766
The Sephardic chief rabbi of
Israel on Sunday sent a letter criticizing the pope for his remarks on
Islam to a leading Sunni Islamic legal scholar in Qatar.
In the
letter, Sephardic Chief Rabbi Shlomo Amar wrote to Sheikh Yusef Kardawi,
"our way is to honor every religion and every nation according to their
paths, as it is written in the book of prophets: 'because every nation
will go in the name of its lord.'"
"Even when there is a struggle
between nations" Amar added, "it cannot be turned into a war of
religions."
The letter, written in Arabic, was delivered to Kardawi
by a leader of the Islamic Movement in Israel, Sheikh Abdullah Naimar
Darwish. Amar sent the letter first to Rabbi Menachem Froman, chief rabbi
of the West Bank settlement of Tekoa, who is known as a champion of
inter-religious reconciliation.
In his introduction to the letter,
Froman added to Amar's remarks, saying "every Jew who learns the writings
of the great sages - who, at the head of them all stands Maimonides -
knows that our great thinkers wrote in the Arabic language, lived in
Islamic states and participated with the great Muslim thinkers in the
effort to explain the words of God, according to the paths of the sages
and amidst the difficult bloody battles that we have had since the
beginning of Zionism with the Muslims.
"We know... that the war
between the Jews and the Muslims is the work of the cursed devil. We know
that Islam is named after peace," wrote Froman.
Islamists: Pope
has not yet made 'clear apology'
Egypt's Muslim Brotherhood on
Sunday said Pope Benedict had not made a "clear apology" for remarks on
Islam that sparked anger across the Muslim world.
Pope Benedict
said on Sunday he was "deeply sorry" for the anger caused by his
remarks on Islam and said a quote he used from a medieval text about holy
wars did not reflect his personal thoughts.
Brotherhood deputy
leader Mohammed Habib said the pope's apology "does not rise to the level
of a clear apology and, based on this, we're calling on the Pope of the
Vatican to issue a clear apology that will decisively end any
confusion."
Earlier Sunday, however, Habib had described the Pope's
remarks as a "sufficient apology," and said the Muslim Brotherhood,
Egypt's main opposition movement, would accept Benedict XVI's apology.
"We consider that the new statements represent a retreat from what
went before. We can consider them a sufficient apology, even if we had
wanted the Pope to outline his ideas and vision of Islam," Habib said
earlier Sunday.
On Saturday, the Muslim Brotherhood said a Vatican
statement saying the Pope was sorry did not go far enough, and called for
a personal apology from the pontiff.
A leading Israeli Arab Islamic
group on Sunday said it refused to accept the papal apology, claiming it
was still 'insufficient,' Israel Radio reported.
The statement,
issued by the northern branch of the Islamic Movement, came two days after
its leader, Sheik Ra'ad Salah, declared that Jerusalem was destined to become the capital
of a pan-Islamic caliphate at a gathering in the northern
city of Umm al-Fahm.
Two West Bank churches were set afire early
Sunday as a wave of Muslim anger over comments by Pope Benedict XVI on
Islam grew throughout the Palestinian areas and the Muslim world. The two
arson cases followed Saturday attacks on five churches in the West Bank
and Gaza.
Speaking to pilgrims at his Castelgandolfo summer
residence, the Pope said he was "deeply sorry for the reactions in some
countries to a few passages of my address at the University of Regensburg,
which were considered offensive to the sensibility of
Muslims."
"These in fact were a quotation from a medieval text,
which do not in any way express my personal thought. I hope this serves to
appease hearts and to clarify the true meaning of my address, which in its
totality was and is an invitation to frank and sincere dialogue, with
mutual respect," he said.
Wave of attacks on churches
In
the West Bank town of Tul Karm Sunday, a stone church built 170 years ago
was torched before dawn and its entire inside was destroyed, local
Christian officials said. In the village of Tubas, a small church was
attacked with firebombs and partially burned, Christians said. Neither
church is Catholic, the officials said.
On Saturday, Muslims hurled
firebombs and opened fire at five churches in the West Bank and Gaza Strip
to protest the Pope's comments, sparking concerns of a rift between
Palestinian Muslims and Christians.
Jerusalem's Latin Patriarch,
Michel Sabbah, the top Roman Catholic cleric in the Holy Landplanned to
visit the city of Nablus in an effort to repair Christian-Muslim relations
later Sunday.
Christians are believed to number about 50,000 people
in the West Bank, Gaza Strip and East Jerusalem, about 2 percent of the
total Palestinian population. Relations are generally good and the
Palestinian Authority has made considerable efforts to ensure their
political representation, though tensions periodically flare
up.
The Pope last week, in a talk rejecting any religious
motivation for violence, cited the words of a Byzantine emperor who
characterized some of the teachings of the Prophet Mohammed as "evil and
inhuman," particularly "his command to spread by the sword the
faith."
The pontiff did not endorse that description, but he did
not question it, and his words set off a firestorm of protests across the
Muslim world.
Army Radio reported Sunday that security had been
stepped up for the Pontiff, for fear of attempts by extremists to harm
him.
In Tul Karm, church official Daoud Firoba said Palestinian
security had guarded the Greek Orthodox church until midnight, but then
left. The entire inside of the sanctuary was burned, including furniture
and an ornate wooden door, Firoba said. Books that are 500 years old
survived, he said.
"This hurts my heart, this is against my God and
my religion," Firoba said. "But I think that those who burned it don't
understand that we are Palestinians and we are not related."
The
church is used by three Christian families left in Tul Karm, Firoba said.
In the small village of Tubas, Christian resident Michel Sayer
said that he smelled smoke at three in the morning. "I came and saw the
church was on fire and immediately we put it out," Sayer said. "We found
two firebombs outside that were not thrown in and three inside that had
been thrown." About 100 Christians live in Tubas, Sayer
said.
Five churches attacked on Saturday
The Saturday
attacks on four of the 10 churches in the West Bank town of Nablus, and on
the Greek Orthodox Church in Gaza City unsettled a relatively peaceful
coexistence in the city.
The assaults began with fire bombings of
Nablus' Anglican and Greek Orthodox churches, which left trails of black
scorch marks in their wake. At least five firebombs were hurled at the
Anglican church, whose door was later set ablaze in a separate attack.
Smoke billowed from the church as firefighters put out the
flames
In a phone call to The Associated Press, a group calling
itself the "Lions of Monotheism" claimed responsibility, saying the
attacks were meant to protest the pope's remarks about Islam.
Hours
later, four masked gunmen doused the main doors of Nablus' Roman and Greek
Catholic churches with lighter fluid, then set them ablaze. They also
opened fire on the buildings, pocking their outer walls with bullet
holes.
In Gaza City, militants opened fire from a car at a Greek
Orthodox church, hitting the facade. A policeman at the scene said he saw
a car escape with armed men inside. Explosive devices were set off at the
same Gaza church on Friday, causing minor damage.
There were no
claims of responsibility for the last three attacks. Said Siyam, the
interior minister from Hamas, ordered extra protection for churches across
the West Bank and Gaza.
"The atmosphere is charged already, and the
wise should not accept such acts," said Father Yousef Saada, a Greek
Catholic priest in Nablus.
Ayman Daraghmeh, a Hamas legislator,
denounced the attacks, and urged Palestinian police to do more to protect
Christian sites.