Vicar of the Holy Land makes case for children and mothers dying in Gaza

Agency report

“We cannot close our eyes and hearts to hungry and scared children. We cannot remain indifferent to knowing that 60,000 pregnant women in Gaza suffer from hunger and malnutrition in their delicate and important condition: that of giving life.”

Fr. Ibrahim Faltas, Vicar of the Custody of the Holy Land, made this new impassioned plea on Saturday in an interview with the Italian Catholic news agency, SIR.

The Egyptian-born Franciscan friar is currently in Italy to coordinate the transfer of dozens of children from the Gaza Strip to several pediatric hospitals across the country, following a recent agreement with the Italian authorities. The first group arrived on January 29.

In the interview, Fr. Faltas recalled that, as in every war, the first innocent victims of the ongoing armed conflict between Israel and Hamas are women and children.

Over 9,000 Palestinian women have been killed since the outbreak of war on October 7, 2023.

“Many children have been left orphans, and many mothers have lost their children,” he said, adding that Gazawi children without food risk dying of hunger and that every day women risk their lives to give birth in the midst of falling bombs.

“Humanity will fall into an abyss if it does not satisfy the primary needs of the defenseless.”

These children need immediate answers to survive, said Fr. Faltas. “We can’t just tell them that their hunger must wait until the powerful people of the world have given their permission to feed them” or just leave them starving.

“I listen to their stories; I read their stories, and I try to understand how certain adults don’t feel the need to stop, to help, to stop committing injustices,” the Franciscan friar lamented.

“How can we cancel the trauma of someone who was under the rubble and saved himself while other members of his family died next to him? How can we console that child of a few years old who tries to console his mother who has lost another child?”

“Let us pray,” the Vicar concluded, “that the light of truth that defeats hypocrisy may touch consciences. We defend those who suffer the evils of war, we try to be the voice of those who no longer have a voice to ask for truth, justice, and peace.”