Vatican body asks UN to 'end Israeli occupation'

The following are excerpts from the original story source

In final statement of two-week conference, bishops' synod urges international community to take 'necessary legal steps to put an end to the occupation of the different Arab territories'.

Israel cannot use the Biblical concept of a promised land or a chosen people to justify new "settlements" in Jerusalem or territorial claims, a Vatican synod on the Middle East said on Saturday.

In its concluding message after two weeks of meetings, the synod of bishops from the Middle East also said it hoped a two-state solution for peace between Israel and the Palestinians could be lifted from dream to reality and called for peaceful conditions that would stop a Christian exodus from the region.

"We have meditated on the situation of the holy city of Jerusalem. We are anxious about the unilateral initiatives that threaten its composition and risk to change its demographic balance," the message said.

In a separate part of the document -- a section on cooperation with Jews -- the synod fathers also took issue with Jews who use the Bible to justify settlements in the West Bank, which Israel captured in 1967.

"Recourse to theological and biblical positions which use the Word of God to wrongly justify injustices is not acceptable," the document said.

Many Jewish settlers and right-wing Israelis claim a biblical birthright to the West Bank, which they call Judea and Samaria and regard as a part of historical, ancient Israel given to the Jews by God.

Asked about the passage at a news conference, Greek-Melchite Archbishop Cyrille Salim Bustros, said:

"We Christians cannot speak about the promised land for the Jewish people. There is no longer a chosen people. All men and women of all countries have become the chosen people.

"The concept of the promised land cannot be used as a base for the justification of the return of Jews to Israel and the displacement of Palestinians," he added. "The justification of Israel's occupation of the land of Palestine cannot be based on sacred scriptures."

The synod's concluding message repeated a Vatican call for Jerusalem to have a special status "which respects its particular character" as a city sacred to the three great monotheistic religions -- Judaism, Christianity and Islam.

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It makes me sick to death to hear of the "creative ways" mankind has attempted to interpret God's Holy Inspired Word in ways to suit their agenda of removing Israel from the face of the earth. God made an everlasting covenant through the line of Abraham, Isaac, Jacob, and all the generations that follow them. God is a covenant maker...not a covenant breaker.

Israel and the Jewish people are the apple of God's eye...HIS chosen. Somehow, people can't seem to comprehend that fact.

The article states that, "We have meditated on the situation of the holy city of Jerusalem." Perhaps they should try falling on their knees in fervent prayer asking forgiveness, and then, carefully study the Scriptures to rid themselves of their Spiritual blindness.

The world against Israel is on a sure collision course with God over Israel's covenant land.

Zechariah 12:9
"And it shall come to pass in that day, that I will seek to destroy all the nations that come against Jerusalem."

Don