Pope Francis spoke on the phone with Israeli President Isaac Herzog about the Israel-Hamas war in late October.
The conversation between the pair was described as a “fraught phone call,” according to a Washinton Post report Thursday, citing a senior Israeli official familiar with the call, which has not been previously reported.
Herzog was telling Francis of the unprecedented level of shock felt in Israel after the Hamas attack on October 7 when the pope said bluntly that it is “forbidden to respond to terror with terror,” according to the Post, citing the Israeli official.
A Vatican source on Friday confirmed to CNN that a phone call between the Israeli president and the pope took place at the end of October, but CNN has been unable to verify that Francis used the “terror” remarks.
In a statement to the Washington Post about the call, the Vatican said, “The phone call, like others in the same days, takes place in the context of the Holy Father’s efforts aimed at containing the gravity and scope of the conflict situation in the Holy Land.”
A few days after his phone call with Herzog, the pope spoke to Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas on November 2. On October 22, Francis called United States President Joe Biden about the war.
Some background: The pope has publicly described the war between Israel and Hamas as terrorism.
On November 22, during a general audience in St. Peter’s Square, Francis said, “This morning, I received two delegations, one of Israelis who have relatives as hostages in Gaza and another of Palestinians who have relatives suffering in Gaza. They suffer so much, and I heard how they both suffer: wars do this, but here we have gone beyond war. This is not war; this is terrorism.”
The pope has repeatedly called for a ceasefire in the Israel-Hamas war and is in regular contact with the Catholic community in Gaza.