Pope Francis called for the release of Israeli hostages held in Gaza and spoke with U.S. President Joe Biden to discuss the humanitarian crisis and the need to de-escalate violence in the region.

The Vatican, especially Pope Francis, must double its efforts and urge the international community to end the massacre of Palestinians killed in Gaza in the Israel-Hamas war, Palestine's ambassador to Denmark said.

Not even the horrifying violence spiralling beyond imagining in the Holy Land should blind us to Hamas’ ultimate responsibility for the carnage resulting for its Oct. 7 slaughter of Israeli innocents.

On the same day the Toronto Board of Rabbis pleaded with their co-religionists to show public solidarity, Cardinal Pierbattista Pizzaballa, Latin Patriarch of Jerusalem, offered himself as one such sign.

The Catholic Church's highest ranking prelate in the Holy Land offered his "absolute availability" to be exchanged for Israeli children taken hostage by Hamas.

Patriarchs and heads of all the churches in Jerusalem have issued an urgent appeal to Israel and the international community to open a humanitarian corridor, to assist people caught in what many fear is an imminent humanitarian disaster in the Gaza Strip.  

After the Oct. 7 attack on Israel by Hamas terrorist, Israel is now at war with Hamas and the security not only of Israel but of Jews worldwide is at stake. Many journalists, politicians and faith leaders have struggled with what to say either staying silent or releasing nebulous statements failing to assign moral responsibility. To navigate all of this we need firm moral principles, a sense of history and some clear-headed realism.

Just before the children in her kindergarten class went on vacation for the Jewish Sukkot Festival, Romina Shvalb, 42, a kindergarten teacher in the quiet Israeli kibbutz of Nir Oz near the Gaza border, had baked challah -- the braided sweet bread Jews traditionally eat on the Sabbath and holidays -- with the children.

We applaud and magnify the sombre yet vital words the good people of Christian-Jewish Dialogue of Toronto issued in the aftermath of last weekend’s heart-wrenching atrocities in the Holy Land.

My sister is a Shabbat-observing Orthodox Jew. When I saw the news trickling out of Israel on Saturday morning, I knew I wouldn’t be able to check in with her until that night. Her phone is off from Friday evening until Saturday sundown. Then I remembered that it was Simchat Torah, and that observant Jews in the U.S. wouldn’t be turning their phones back on until Sunday evening.

Pilgrims who were in Israel following a surprise terrorist attack by Hamas terrorists against civilian communities in southern Israel Oct. 7 lit candles and said prayers of peace at the Church of the Holy Sepulcher as fighting continued in southern Israel.

The shock of the surprise attack by Hamas militants on Israel, in which hundreds were killed, wounded or kidnapped, has left a traumatic mark on Israeli citizens, said the country’s ambassador to the Vatican.

Patriarchs and Heads of the Churches in Jerusalem united in a call for peace and justice amid unfolding violence, following a surprise attack by Hamas in southern Israel, which has left over 700 Israelis dead, among them civilians and dozens of soldiers and police who were killed battling the Hamas fighters. Over 2,000 people were injured. Israeli media said that more than 250 bodies had been recovered from the site of the music festival that was attacked by Hamas fighters on Oct. 7 in southern Israel.

VATICAN CITY -- Pope Francis named Archbishop Adolfo Yllana to be apostolic nuncio to Israel and to Cyprus and apostolic delegate in Jerusalem and Palestine.

For nine years, Randa Aweis battled kidney disease, urgently in need of a transplant.