(The Stream)—When Italian Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni earlier this week blasted France’s decision to recognize Palestine at the United Nations General Assembly as “counterproductive,” the Catholic Church’s second-highest authority responded by calling for the Vatican to follow in France’s footsteps.
Vatican Secretary of State Cardinal Pietro Parolin’s statement to reporters on July 28 is being seen as an attack on Meloni and an endorsement of French President Emmanuel Macron’s support for Palestine. It comes amid rising antisemitism in traditionally Catholic Italy.
“We’ve already recognized [the State of Palestine] … for us it’s the solution,” said Parolin, the brains behind the Vatican’s secret deal with the Chinese Communist Party, in response to Macron’s July 24 announcement that France will officially recognize the State of Palestine in September.
Top Vatican officials like Cardinal Augusto Paolo Lojudice, judge of the Vatican City Court of Cassation, are also whipping up anti-Israel sentiment. In a July 21 interview with Italian daily La Stampa, Lojudice accused Israel of “killing children in food lines.”
Vatican observers say that Lojudice, who worked closely with Pope Leo XIV for several years, is so close to the new pontiff that he is acting as a proxy and saying what the pope cannot. According to Vatican insiders, Parolin also is acting as Leo’s mouthpiece.
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