• Pierbattista Pizzaballa: Expansion of Jewish settlements in West Bank makes prospect of peace deal ‘increasingly difficult’
• ‘In Gaza, there are 2 million people locked up in the poverty of a tiny strip of land, left without water and electricity for several hours a day’

Francesco Bongarra

RIMINI, Italy: The Palestinian people feel “abandoned by the international community,” the Latin patriarch of Jerusalem said on Saturday at a conference on inter-religious dialogue in the Italian city of Rimini.

The expansion of Jewish settlements in the West Bank makes the prospect of an Israeli-Palestinian peace agreement “increasingly difficult,” added Pierbattista Pizzaballa, the most senior Catholic figure in the Holy Land.

“In Gaza, there are 2 million people locked up in the poverty of a tiny strip of land, left without water and electricity for several hours a day,” he said.

“Palestinians now believe that they have been abandoned by the international community and are left alone to fight for their country, for Palestine.”

Dr. Mohammad bin Abdulkarim Al-Issa, secretary-general of the Muslim World League, will address the conference on Sunday.