JERUSALEM (CNS): “It is time to look for more peace in the region and in Israel and Palestine,” Archbishop Michel Sabbah, retired Latin patriarch of Jerusalem, said in a statement on May 15, a day which the Palestinians commemorate as the Nakba, or disaster, when Israel declared its independence in 1948. Israel celebrates its independence according to the Jewish lunar calendar on the 5th of Iyar, which every year falls on a different secular date.
 

JERUSALEM (CNS): “It is beyond conception that a law with constitutional effect ignores an entire segment of the population, as if its members never existed,” said a July 30 statement from the Latin Patriarchate of Jerusalem which strongly criticised Israel’s recently adopted Nation State Law.
 
The law, which defines Israel as the nation-state of the Jewish people, was passed by the 120-seat Knesset (parliament) early on July 19, receiving 62 votes.
 

JERUSALEM (Agencies): “We need to pray more for peace and our conversion and for all,” Archbishop Pierbattista Pizzaballa, Jerusalem’s Latin Patriarchate said in a statement as the United States of America (US), inaugurated its new embassy in Jerusalem amid violent protests between Palestinian protesters and Israeli soldiers., La Croix reported. 
 

VATICAN CITY (CNS): Italian authorities arrested six suspects who allegedly received orders from the Islamic State terrorist group to attack the Vatican and the Israeli embassy in Rome.

The arrests, made in Lombardy and Piedmont on April 28, were the result of a joint operation coordinated by the district attorney of Milan and the Italian anti-terrorism agency.