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March 31 (UPI) -- Catholic leaders in East Jerusalem in the occupied West Bank compared Gaza's suffering to the crucifixion of Jesus in an Easter message as protestant leaders also decried Israel's continuing war in the Palestinian enclave. Cardinal Pierbattista Pizzaballa, the Latin Patriarch of Jerusalem who leads Roman Catholics in the Holy Land, released a video message on Saturday while flanked by other church leaders in which he again expressed support for Gaza.
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"All together, we want to express our best wishes for a happy Easter, as much as possible. We always pray for you. We try to support you as much as we can," Pizzaballa said in English, adding for Palestinian Christians in Gaza, "Don't lose your faith. Don't lose your hope. You are not alone."
William Shomali, an auxiliary bishop born in the West Bank, said Good Friday "has lasted for six months" for people in Gaza, a symbolic expression for the prolonged distress faced by Palestinians suffering through Israel's war. Good Friday commemorates the day the biblical Jesus was crucified by Pontius Pilate, the Roman governor of Judea, at the request of Jewish religious leaders.
"Definitely, after this long dark night, Sunday, the day of the Resurrection, will come," Shomali said, referring to the end of the conflict and seemingly hinting at the formal recognition of a Palestinian state. "And this prolonged struggle will cease. And God is more than able to make something good out of this evil."
Gabriel Romanelli, the parish priest of the Holy Family Parish in Gaza, similarly compared the suffering of people in Gaza to that of Jesus. Specifically, he said that the Palestinian "experience of Golgotha has not ended yet."
Golgotha, a term rooted in the Aramaic word for "skull," has been used to describe the site outside the walls of ancient Jerusalem where Jesus was crucified. By using this distinct phrase, Romanelli appeared to be equating Palestinian suffering to that of Jesus on the cross.
Each of the church leaders who spoke in the message has previously been vocal in support of Palestine. In November, shortly after the war broke out, Romanelli said that life in Gaza has never been peaceful.
"The war wages on. Hatred is on the rise. The killing of innocents continues, spreading violence in all its many forms," Hosam Naoum, the Anglican Archbishop in Jerusalem, a Protestant denomination, said in an Easter statement.
"We weep, mourn and lament over this situation, just as our Lord Jesus wept over the Holy City because its people did not know the things that would bring peace. Christ desired peace for Jerusalem."
And the Patriarchs and Heads of the Churches in Jerusalem, an affiliation of inter-faith Christian leaders that includes Pizzaballa and his Greek Orthodox counterpart Theophilus III, released a new statement ahead of Easter calling for a cease-fire, the distribution of humanitarian aid and the allowing of medical treatment in Gaza.
