Skip To Content
JEWISH. INDEPENDENT. NONPROFIT.
Breaking News

Vatican Signs First Treaty With ‘Palestine’

The Vatican signed its first treaty with the “State of Palestine” on Friday, calling for “courageous decisions” to end the Israeli-Palestinian conflict with a two-state solution.

The treaty concerned the Catholic Church’s activities in areas controlled by the Palestinian Authority.

The Israeli foreign ministry said it regretted the move, calling the signing of a treaty, which implies there is an official Palestinian state, “a hasty step (that) damages the prospects for advancing a peace agreement.”

But Archbishop Paul Gallagher, the Vatican’s foreign minister, said he hoped the agreement could be a “stimulus to bringing a definitive end to the long-standing Israeli-Palestinian conflict, which continues to cause suffering for both Parties.”

He said he hoped that a peace process directly negotiated between Israelis and Palestinians could resume and lead to a two-state solution.

“This certainly requires courageous decisions, but it will also offer a major contribution to peace and stability in the region,” he said..

The U.N. General Assembly adopted a resolution in 2012 recognizing Palestine as an observer non-member state. This was welcomed at the time by the Vatican, which has the same observer non-member status at the United Nations.

Since then the Vatican has de facto recognized a “State of Palestine” and Pope Francis referred to it by that name when he visited the Holy Land last year.—Reuters

Republish This Story

Please read before republishing

We’re happy to make this story available to republish for free, unless it originated with JTA, Haaretz or another publication (as indicated on the article) and as long as you follow our guidelines. You must credit the Forward, retain our pixel and preserve our canonical link in Google search.  See our full guidelines for more information, and this guide for detail about canonical URLs.

To republish, copy the HTML by clicking on the yellow button to the right; it includes our tracking pixel, all paragraph styles and hyperlinks, the author byline and credit to the Forward. It does not include images; to avoid copyright violations, you must add them manually, following our guidelines. Please email us at [email protected], subject line “republish,” with any questions or to let us know what stories you’re picking up.

We don't support Internet Explorer

Please use Chrome, Safari, Firefox, or Edge to view this site.