ROME – Wars, especially in the 21st century, are fought on multiple levels. Beyond what happens on the battlefield, there’s also the “soft power” contest to claim the high moral ground, and in that sense, one of the emerging fronts in the bloody conflict in Gaza now pits Israel against the Christian leadership of the Holy Land.
In that standoff, the Vatican for the moment appears caught somewhere in the middle, though over time it’s likely that its position will shift in the direction of the Christian leadership – in part because one of those leaders is their own man on the ground, Cardinal Pierbattista Pizzaballa, the Latin Patriarch of Jerusalem.
