President George W. Bush refers to the “war on terror” as a “crusade” a few days after the staged false flag 9/11 terrorists attacks:
https://www.c-span.org/video/?c4752493/user-clip-bush-war-terror-crusade
Many might think that was a slip or mistake, but I don’t think so. I believe he meant what he said, and that he had most likely been told by his Catholic advisors to use that word.
George W. Bush the “nation’s first Catholic president”
In 2008, during George W. Bush’s presidency, The Washington Post published the op-ed “A Catholic Wind in the White House”, where he was referred to as the “nation’s first Catholic president”;
Shortly after Pope Benedict XVI’s election in 2005, President Bush met with a small circle of advisers in the Oval Office. As some mentioned their own religious backgrounds, the president remarked that he had read one of the new pontiff’s books about faith and culture in Western Europe.
Save for one other soul, Bush was the only non-Catholic in the room. But his interest in the pope’s writings was no surprise to those around him. As the White House prepares to welcome Benedict on Tuesday, many in Bush’s inner circle expect the pontiff to find a kindred spirit in the president. Because if Bill Clinton can be called America’s first black president, some say, then George W. Bush could well be the nation’s first Catholic president.
This isn’t as strange a notion as it sounds. Yes, there was John F. Kennedy. But where Kennedy sought to divorce his religion from his office, Bush has welcomed Roman Catholic doctrine and teachings into the White House and based many important domestic policy decisions on them.
“I don’t think there’s any question about it,” says Rick Santorum, former U.S. senator from Pennsylvania and a devout Catholic, who was the first to give Bush the “Catholic president” label. “He’s certainly much more Catholic than Kennedy.”
Bush attends an Episcopal church in Washington and belongs to a Methodist church in Texas, and his political base is solidly evangelical. Yet this Protestant president has surrounded himself with Roman Catholic intellectuals, speechwriters, professors, priests, bishops and politicians. These Catholics — and thus Catholic social teaching — have for the past eight years been shaping Bush’s speeches, policies and legacy to a degree perhaps unprecedented in U.S. history.
“I used to say that there are more Catholics on President Bush’s speechwriting team than on any Notre Dame starting lineup in the past half-century,” said former Bush scribe — and Catholic — William McGurn.
https://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2008/04/11/AR2008041103327_pf.html
In April 2008, Bush said he sees God in Pope Benedict‘s eyes:
Finally, Arroyo asked him, “You said, famously, when you looked into Vladimir Putin’s eyes you saw his soul. […] When you look into Benedict XVI’s eyes what do you see?”
And Bush answered immediately, “God.”
https://zenit.org/articles/bush-says-he-sees-god-in-eyes-of-pope/
Now the crusade reference is starting to make more sense, isn’t it?
In 2004 Bush spoke at the Knights of Columbus (K of C ) convention. The Knights of Columbus is a Catholic fraternal order, founded by Michael J. McGivney, a Catholic priest, who had originally wanted to become a Jesuit. Today the order has almost 2 million members around the world. Bush’s brother Jeb, a devout Roman Catholic, is a 4th degree Knight of Columbus.
George W. Bush at the K of C convention
Notice the Roman fasces in the K of C logo. There’s a fasces also on both sides behind the Speaker’s podium in the United States House of Representatives, which is inside the United States Capitol.
(On the outside, the United States Capitol looks a lot like the St. Peter’s Basilica, is located on Capitol Hill, as in the Capitoline Hill in Rome, and what’s more, both these buildings face an obelisk. Do you think they might be trying to tell us something…)
George Bush Sr. spoke at the Knight of Columbus convention in 1984, 1988 and 1992, and he was an honorary Knight of Malta, like Ronald Reagan, who historically established diplomatic relations with the Vatican in 1984. In 1991, George Bush hosted the Grand Master of the Knights of Malta, Andrew Bertie, at the White House.
Andrew Bertie and George Bush at the White House, 1991
George W. Bush has also spoken many times at the Legatus summit. Legatus is a global network of Catholic business leaders, founded by Tom Monaghan, the founder of Domino’s Pizza. Monaghan is a Knight of Malta.
But weren’t the “Jewish” Neocons behind the Iraq War?
It’s true that leading neoconservatives played a major part in the buildup to the Iraq War, and that many of them were Jewish, such as these men who served in key positions in the Bush administration: Paul Wolfowitz, Deputy Secretary of Defense (2001-2005); Douglas J. Feith, Under Secretary of Defense for Policy (2001-2005), Elliot Abrams; Richard Perle; and Bill Kristol, the founder of the neoconservative think tank Project for the New American Century (PNAC), which initiated an open letter to Jesuit trained President Bill Clinton calling for the removal of Saddam Hussein already in 1998.
Neocons weren’t all Jewish, though, and among the 25 signatories to the PNAC’s Statement of Principles were these non-Jewish men, for example:
– Jeb Bush, Governor of Florida (1999-2007), brother of George W. Bush. He’s a devout Roman Catholic and 4th degree Knight of Columbus.
– Dick Cheney, Vice President of the United States (2001-2009). Cheney was probably the most powerful government official in the Bush admistration, or the de facto president. In the 1980s and 1990s he was a director of the Council on Foreign Relations (CFR), the New York City based globalist think tank that has enormous influence on the US government.
— Donald Rumsfeld, Secretary of Defense (2001-2006). Rumsfeld attended Georgetown University, the formidable Jesuit university in Washington D.C., which is also the Jesuit headquarters in America. While attending Princeton, he was a friend of future Secretary of Defense under Reagan and Knight of Malta, Frank Carlucci. Carlucci and Rumsfeld were also associates during their political careers, and Carlucci, too, was affiliated with the PNAC.
– Frank Gaffney, a national security advisor in the Reagan administration. Gaffney was Jesuit trained at Georgetown University and is a member of the conservative counterpart of the CFR, the Council for National Policy (CNP). (Among CNP members are also Trump’s key advisors Kellyanne Conway and Jesuit trained Steve Bannon.)
– William J. Bennett, a conservative pundit. Bennett graduated form a Jesuit high school and served in the Reagan and George H.W. Bush administrations.
– Zalmay Khalilzad, United States Ambassador to Afghanistan (2003-2004), United States Ambassador to Iraq (2005-2007), U.S. Special Representative for Afghanistan Reconciliation. Khalilzad has been a CFR member and served as a counselor to the Center for Strategic and International Studies (CSIS), the think tank founded at Georgetown University in 1962. (The formal affiliation between CSIS and Georgetown ended in 1987.)
It’s also worth noting that Elliot Abrams has been affiliated with the Georgetown University and taught foreign policy at its Edmund A. Walsh School of Foreign Service, and that Douglas J. Feith has a JD from Georgetown University and, like Abrams, was later employed by the Edmund A. Walsh School of Foreign Service, where he taught a course on the Bush administration’s anti-terrorism policy.
My take is that the neocons weren’t behind the staged 9/11 attacks or the ”war on terror”. They played a major part temporarily, but in the grand scheme of things, they’re not that significant a group. While times change, the Jesuit Papacy stays, movements like neoconservatism come and go.
The Jesuits, CIA, and CFR deflecting the blame by pointing at Israel
This news snippet about a 2005 congress mock impeachment inquiry over the Iraq war is telling:
The session took an awkward turn when witness Ray McGovern, a former intelligence analyst, declared that the United States went to war in Iraq for oil, Israel and military bases craved by administration “neocons” so “the United States and Israel could dominate that part of the world.” He said that Israel should not be considered an ally and that Bush was doing the bidding of Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon.
“Israel is not allowed to be brought up in polite conversation,” McGovern said. “The last time I did this, the previous director of Central Intelligence called me anti-Semitic.”
Rep. James P. Moran Jr. (D-Va.), who prompted the question by wondering whether the true war motive was Iraq’s threat to Israel, thanked McGovern for his “candid answer.”
https://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2005/06/16/AR2005061601570_pf.html
Ex-CIA Ray McGovern said the same on MSNBC The Situation with Tucker Carlson in May 2006:
I‘ve been using the acronym O.I.L. for many—for two years now: O for oil; I for Israel; and L for logistics, logistics being the permanent—now we say “enduring”—military bases that the U.S. wants to keep in Iraq.
http://www.nbcnews.com/id/12644626
And, as it happens, McGovern is Jesuit trained. He has a MS from Fordham University, the Jesuit university in New York City. And so is James P. Moran Jr., who has a BA from the Jesuit College of the Holy Cross. Just a coincidence? McGovern also used to be a regular guest of Alex Jones, who’s been outed as a CIA asset and gatekeeper for the Vatican years ago.
Another Jesuit trained ex-CIA, who’s been pointing fingers at Israel, is Michael Scheuer. He attended Jesuit Canisius College in Buffalo and used to be an adjunct professor at the Georgetown University’s Center for Peace and Security Studies.
(The CIA itself has even been called “Catholics in Action”, because it’s been largely dominated by Roman Catholics, many of them devout mass-goers. The founder himself, William J. Donovan, was a devout Roman Catholic and was awarded the highest possible honor by the Pope, Knight of St. Sylvester. And at least these notable CIA directors have been Knights of Malta: John McCone (1961-1965), William Colby (1973-1976), and William J. Casey (1981-1987). In recent years, most CIA directors have been Jesuit trained, such as George Tenet (1997-2004), Leon Panetta (2009-2011), David Petraues (2011-2012), and John Brennan (2013-2017).)
Scheuer used to be a regular guest on CBS News and Fox News and has focused a lot on criticizing Israel and AIPAC, saying things like “we’re fighting wars for Israel” on TV. In his 2004 book Imperial Hubris, as an anonymous author, he said that one step in stopping the bogus “war on terror”, which was supposedly being fought against al-Qaeda and other jihadists, would be to “end all U.S. aid to Israel” and the “elimination of the Jewish state, and in its stead the creation of an Islamic Palestinian state”.
Scheuer also praised the New York Times Best Seller book The Israel Lobby and U.S. Foreign Policy (2007), which sparked controversy and describes the lobby as a “loose coalition of individuals and organizations who actively work to steer U.S. foreign policy in a pro-Israel direction” and “focuses primarily on the lobby’s influence on U.S. foreign policy and its negative effect on American interests”.
John Mearsheimer, co-author of the book with Stephen Walt, happens to be a CFR member, as was another prominent endorser of the book, Jesuit trained Zbigniew Brzezinski. Brzezinski co-founded the globalist think tank Trilateral Commission with Japanese Jesuit coadjutor Tadashi Yamamoto, was a scholar for the Center for Strategic and International Studies, and worked closely with PNAC associate Zalmay Khalilzad on Operation Cyclone to support the mujahideen jihadists, who resisted the Soviet Union’s invasion of Afghanistan. Brzezinski and his protege Khalilzad were instrumental in building up Islamic fundamentalism in Afghanistan, to be used as a tool of US geopolitics in the Middle East.
An in-depth look into Khalilzad’s dealings in the Middle East here.
Iraq War benefited Iran more than Israel?
Excellent scholarly researcher Francisco Gil-White, who got fired from the University of Pennsylvania for exposing the PLO, and basically being pro-Israel, while his superior, CFR member Ian Lustick was anti-Israel, writes:
Could a Shia-dominated Islamist Iraq under Iran’s influence be what the US ruling elite wants?
Consider something else that Newsweek says:
“Iranian interference continues to haunt future scenarios for an independent, stable Iraq. [US ambassador to Iraq Zalmay] Khalilzad, echoing other US officials, said he is hoping for a ‘significant withdrawal’ of US troops from Iraq next year. But the Bush administration worries that a fractured Iraq under weak leadership will be Tehran’s playground.”
It appears that Iraq is indeed expected to become “Tehran’s playground.” So the actual effect of the US invasion of Iraq will be to turn it into an Islamist puppet state of Iran.But the text above bears scrutiny. If Khalilzad is “echoing other US officials” when he says he would like a major troop withdrawal by next year, then which “Bush administration” is it that “worries that a fractured Iraq…will be Tehran’s playground”? Isn’t the Bush administration composed of “US officials”? And isn’t Khalilzad, the US Ambassador to Iraq, supposed to be mouthing the US’s official policy towards Iraq? And if the growth of Iranian power is not what the US ruling elite wants, then why are Khalilzad and other US officials calling for withdrawing the troops, a policy that will abandon Iraq to Iran?
http://www.hirhome.com/iraniraq/iraq-general-intro.htm
Gil-White continues:
The US ruling elite will pull the troops out of Iraq in order to give Iraq to Iran, but will complain publicly about the outcome, giving the appearance of withdrawing the troops under pressure from the US public.
Consistent with this view, consider what the Toronto Star wrote on 24 November 2005, in an article titled “White House sets stage for pullback of troops”:
“Zalmay Khalilzad, the U.S. ambassador to Iraq, also told CNN this week he believed it would be possible to begin a withdrawal of American forces next year. The change in tone appears to be an acknowledgement of the increasing unpopularity of the war, with one national poll this week indicating 65 per cent of Americans would like to see the troops home by the end of 2006.”
The word “also” is appended to Khalilzad’s opinion because he was echoing Pentagon officials and US Secretary of State Condoleeza Rice, whose identical views were reported in the same article. But perhaps you will notice the contradiction in what the Daily News reported Khalilzad as saying only four days later:
“Bush’s ambassador to Iraq warned yesterday that pulling out of the country early would be disastrous. ‘Terrorists could take over part of this country and expand from here,’ Zalmay Khalilzad told Newsweek. ‘And given the resources of Iraq, given the technical expertise of its people, it will make Afghanistan look like child’s play.’”
Since a withdrawal needs to be planned, and since Zalmay Khalilzad’s preferred date for a major withdrawal — “next year” — is already upon us (this is November), Khalilzad is in fact calling for an immediate troop withdrawal even as he explains that “pulling out…early would be disastrous.” An absurdity? Not under my hypothesis: the US ruling elite wants the “disastrous” result, but knows that the American public will deplore it, so US officials must appear to deplore it also, and to be pulling out of Iraq reluctantly, under pressure from the American public. This is precisely why US government statements about impending withdrawal did not come before the polls began to show a strong US majority for it, as we see above.
And that’s exactly what happened after the withdrawal of US troops from Iraq (2007-2011), that is, Iraq became “Tehran’s playground”.
Roman Catholic and Jesuit trained government officials and military officers leading the “war on terror”
Here’s a list of some of the Roman Catholic and/or Jesuit trained key leaders of the “war on terror”:
Secretary of Defense:
– Donald Rumsfeld (2001-2006). Attended Georgetown University. Friend and associate of Knight of Malta Frank Carlucci, Secretary of Defense under Reagan.
– Robert Gates (2006-2011). PhD and and honorary degree from Georgetown University.
– Leon Panetta (2011-2013). BA and JD from Jesuit Santa Clara University.
Deputy National Security Advisor for Iraq and Afghanistan:
– Meghan L. O’Sullivan (2004-2007). Roman Catholic. Graduated from Georgetown University. Member of the board of directors of the CFR and North American Chairman of the Trilateral Commission.
– Douglas Lute (2007-2010). Roman Catholic. His wife Jane Holl Lute, Deputy Secretary of Homeland Security (2009-2013), has a JD from Georgetown University.
Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff:
– Peter Pace (2005-2007). A devout Roman Catholic. Georgetown Leadership Seminar alumnus. Awarded President’s Medal by Georgetown University and John Carroll Medal by the John Carroll Society.
– Michael Mullen (2007-2011). Roman Catholic.
– Martin Dempsey (2011-2015). Roman Catholic.
Commander of the United States Central Command:
– John Abizaid (2003-2007). Roman Catholic.
– William J. Fallon (2007-2008). Roman Catholic. Graduated from a Catholic university.
– Martin Dempsey (2008). See above.
– David Petraeus (2008-2010). Completed a military fellowship at the Georgetown University’s Edmund A. Walsh School of Foreign Service.
– John R. Allen (2010). Graduated with a MA from Georgetown University.
– Jim Mattis (2010-2013). A devout Roman Catholic. Keynote speaker at the 2019 Alfred E. Smith Memorial Foundation Dinner.
Commander of Multi-National Force – Iraq:
– Ricardo Sanchez (2003-2004). Roman Catholic.
– George W. Casey Jr. (2004-2007). Graduated from Jesuit Boston College High School and from Georgetown University with a BS.
– David Petraeus (2007-2008). See above.
– Raymond T. Odierno (2008-2010). Roman Catholic.
Commander of Multi-National Corps — Iraq:
– Peter W. Chiarelli. Roman Catholic. Graduated from Jesuit Seattle University with a BS and from Catholic Salve Regina University with a MA.
– Raymond T. Odierno. See above.
Vatican still wants Jerusalem
Could the underlying reason for the US wars in the Middle East be related to the Vatican’s quest for Jerusalem? It would make a lot of sense, remembering how “crypto-Catholic” George W. Bush talked about these wars being a “crusade”, and noting how they were led mostly by Roman Catholics and Jesuit agents.
Here’s some history of the Vatican’s policy on the status of Jerusalem:
Already during the 19th century, the Holy See was concerned about the control over the holy places in Palestine, especially in Jerusalem. In 1887, Pope Leo XIII issued a motu proprio titled Domini et Salvatoris, in which he called for the establishment of a Catholic fund to maintain the holy places in Jerusalem and the Holy Land.
The early Zionists sought to assure the Vatican of the sanctity of Christian holy places, but the Vatican was not satisfied with these assurances. The Vatican was not invited to attend the 1920 San Remo conference, which decided the fate of Palestine, and had to rely on France and Italy to represent its interests. The San Remo conference set aside a Protectorate of the Holy See. According to Minerbi, the Vatican’s objectives were ultimately undermined by the Zionist Organization’s support for a British Mandate.
But the Vatican did not give up on its objective of direct Catholic control of the Holy Land and the holy places. The Vatican’s idea for an international commission to resolve claims on the holy places had been incorporated in article 95 of the Treaty of Sèvres, and was repeated as articles 13 and 14 of the Mandate. Britain assumed responsibility for the holy places under article 13 of the Mandate. However, Britain never created the International Commission on Holy Places to resolve the other claims in accordance with article 14 of the Mandate.
The Vatican’s official position on the status of Jerusalem was in favour of an internationalization of Jerusalem, in order to keep the holy places away from either Israeli or Arab sovereignty.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Holy_See–Israel_relations#Jerusalem_and_the_holy_places
Why does the Vatican want Jerusalem?
It can’t be that the Vatican is only interested in “access to their Holy Sites” in Jerusalem. They already have that as well as legal jurisdiction under Israeli law for their institutions and assets in Jerusalem. Also, when these “Holy Sites” were under the jurisdiction of the Jordanians from l948-l967, no Pope demanded the “internationalization of Jerusalem”.
It is something else, which the Vatican wants. The Roman Catholic Church, need to have certain versions of events be played out for them to stand in front of mankind and proclaim: “our Messiah has returned.” Of course, to the Jews, this Messiah will be as false as the first one was supposed to be. Don’t matter. This is the goal of the Vatican and this is what all Israelis need to worry about.
[…]
First, you have to realize that for centuries The Vatican has attempted to obtain control of Jerusalem, which started with the Crusades. For them to convince the world that the Messiah they put on the world’s stage is going to be accepted as genuine, they need to perform this play in the Old City. The story of this production is that this “Messiah” will merge the three monotheistic religions, usher in peace and harmony in the world, and solve the Middle East conflict. The location for this “production” will be in none other than the Old City of Jerusalem.
This so-called “Messiah” that will be proclaimed, will be a false one and it will insist that by having a “world government” (i.e., the United Nations) the world peace and harmony will be ushered in. This will be a lie, and a fraud, but never mind. In our world, reality isn’t important. Public perceptions are. The end result is the stripping of Israel’s sovereignty as an independent nation giving way to a “regional bloc of nations” in the Middle East.
http://www.redmoonrising.com/chamish/vaticanagenda.htm
Vatican agent Shimon Peres
Labor Zionist leader and longtime influencer in Israeli politics, Shimon Peres (1923-2016), actually secretly promised to hand over Jerusalem to the Vatican amidst the Oslo Accords negotiations. He met with the Popes and visited the Vatican often, and it’s quite apparent that he was a Vatican agent. On his now defunct website, investigative journalist Barry Chamish (1952-2016) looked back to how he broke the story:
In 1979, Yitzhak Rabin published his autobiography, within was a one-line offbeat quote. He said that unlike all Jewish children growing up in Poland, Shimon Peres spent his early education at a Jesuit school. It was an odd fact and I took a mental note of it without understanding its significance…
Until I broke my first attention-getting story as a political journalist:
In March 1994, the newspaper Chadashot revealed a most remarkable secret of the Middle East “peace” process. A friend of Shimon Peres, the French intellectual Marek Halter… claimed in an interview that in May 1993, he delivered a letter from Peres to the pope. Within, Peres promised to internationalize Jerusalem, granting the UN political control of the Old City of Jerusalem, and the Vatican hegemony of the holy sites within. The UN would give the PLO a capital within its new territory and East Jerusalem would become a kind of free trade zone of world diplomacy.
Halter’s claim was backed by the Italian newspaper La Stampa which added that Arafat was apprised of the agreement and it was included in the secret clauses of the Declaration Of Principles signed in Washington in September 1993.
In March 1995, the Israeli radio station Arutz Sheva was leaked a cable from the Israeli Embassy in Rome to Peres’s Foreign Ministry in Jerusalem confirming the handover of Jerusalem to the Vatican. This cable was printed on the front page of the radical leftwing Israeli newspaper, Ha’aretz two days later. A scandal erupted and numerous rabbis who had invited Peres for Passover services cancelled their invitations in protest of his treachery. Peres reacted by claiming that the cable was real but that someone had whited out the word, “not;” the cable really said that Israel would “not” hand Jerusalem over to the holy pontiff.
Illustrating the sorry political state of Israel’s rabbis, they accepted this cockamamie excuse and re-invited Peres to their tables. However, in the widely distributed minutes of a meeting with Clinton in 1997, Peres reiterated his diplomacy, ending with the words, “as I had previously promised the Holy See.”
http://continuingcounterreformation.blogspot.com/2015/08/barry-chamish-e-mail-august-12-2015.html
Along the way, Peres also publicly expressed his willingness to give the Vatican what he promised;
President Shimon Peres is willing to hand over Israeli sovereignty of key Christian holy sites to the Vatican, a proposition that is reportedly opposed by Interior Minister Eli Yishai and that has ruffled feathers among other senior government officials, Army Radio reported on Monday. Beit Hanassi could not be reached for comment on Monday, as it does not issue statements to the press while the president is abroad. According to the radio report, the president is exerting pressure on the government to give up sovereignty over six sites, including the Church of the Annunciation in Nazareth, the Coenaculum on Mount Zion, Gethsemane on the Mount of Olives in Jerusalem, and the Church of the Multiplication on the Kinneret.
— Jerusalem Post, May 4, 2009
https://www.jpost.com/Israel/Peres-wants-to-yield-sites-to-Vatican
Pope Benedict XVI and Shimon Peres
Shimon Peres and Pope Francis in Israel
Around the same time the Vatican’s representatives made many aggressive statements directed at Israel:
Pope Benedict’s point man for justice and peace issues on Wednesday issued the Vatican’s toughest criticism of Israel since the latest Mideast crisis began, calling Gaza a “big concentration camp.”
Cardinal Renato Martino, president of the Vatican’s Council for Justice and Peace, made his comments in an interview in the Italian online newspaper Il Sussidiario.net.
— Reuters, January 7, 2009
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.
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.
— ynetnews, October 23, 2010
https://www.ynetnews.com/Ext/Comp/ArticleLayout/CdaArticlePrintPreview/1,2506,L-3973590,00.html
“Peace negotiations in the Middle East must tackle the issue of the status of the holy sites of Jerusalem”, Cardinal Jean-Louis Tauran, head of the Vatican’s Council for Interreligious Dialogue, declared several days ago in Rome.
The Vatican’s former foreign minister asked to place some Israeli holy places under Vatican authority, alluding to the Cenacle on Mount Zion and the garden of Gethsemane at the foot of the Mount of Olives in Jerusalem.
The first site also houses what is referred to as King David’s tomb.
“There will not be peace if the question of the holy sites is not adequately resolved”, Tauran said. “The part of Jerusalem within the walls – with the holy sites of the three religions – is humanity’s heritage. The sacred and unique character of the area must be safeguarded and it can only be done with a special, internationally-guaranteed statute”.
The Israeli government and the Vatican are deadlocked in discussions over the status of the religious sites. Vatican officials are now reiterating their demand for control over the religious sites in the ancient and holy city founded by King David as the capital of ancient Israel and now the capital of the reestablished Jewish state.
Danny Ayalon, Israel’s deputy foreign minister, declared that Israel might consider giving the Vatican “a greater role” in operating the sites. In the last weeks, the Roman Catholic Church’s authorities increased their political initiatives for Catholic control over some sites in Jerusalem.
The Vatican’s former arcibishop in Jerusalem, Michel Sabbah, just promoted an appeal to the European Union and United States to “stop the Hebraization of Jerusalem”.
— Giulio Meotti, December 15, 2011
http://www.israelnationalnews.com/News/News.aspx/150757#.T2kwEI6HlJO
Since Jorge Maria Bergoglio became the new Pope, and the first Jesuit pope, in 2013, things have cooled a bit, though, at least seemingly. In June 2014, there was an ecumenical meeting in the Vatican, where Pope Francis, Israeli president Shimon Peres, Palestinian leader Mahmoud Abbas, and Greek Orthodox Patriarch Bartholomew prayed together “for peace in the Middle East”. A Jewish rabbi and a Muslim imam were also present.
And Peres called for the establishment of “United Religions”:
“In the past, the majority of wars were motivated by the idea of nationhood. Today, instead, wars are sparked above all with the excuse of religion,” Peres said.
“Now, given the fact that the United Nations has had its day, what is needed is an Organisation of United Religions, a U.N. of religions. It would be the best way to combat these terrorists who kill in the name of faith because the majority of people are not like them …,” he said.
So, think of this: Why are there all of these powerful Catholic chivalric orders? Such as the Sovereign Military Hospitaller Order of Saint John of Jerusalem, of Rhodes and of Malta aka Knights of Malta, the Equestrian Order of the Holy Sepulchre of Jerusalem aka Knights of the Holy Sepulchre, the Order of Brothers of the German House of Saint Mary in Jerusalem aka Teutonic order, and the Sacred Military Constantinian Order of Saint George. The clue is in their names; many of them they include “Jerusalem”.
