Leo’s social media post follows a similar message from his predecessor, Pope Francis.
JD Vance gives Pope Leo a special American gift
Pope Leo XIV was given a Bears jersey by Vice President J.D. Vance at his first official meeting.
- It was not the first time Leo had spoken about an international conflict. In his first Sunday message, he urged, “There is no more war.”
- Leo’s May 18th inauguration began speculation about whether he would promote social justice, as did Frances.
- Pope Francis repeatedly called for a ceasefire in Gaza, including a message from Easter Sunday a day before his death.
Pope Leo called for a ceasefire in Gaza and the release of all hostages in the general audience on May 28th.
“In the Gaza Strip, the fierce screams are increasingly reaching heaven from mothers and fathers who hold the bodies of dead children firmly,” Leo said at St. Peters Square in Vatican.
“For those in charge, I will renew the appeal. Stop the fight. I will release all hostages. I will fully respect humanitarian law.”
Leo took on the Pope Conclave earlier this month after being selected as the close-up Pope Conclave after Francis’ death on April 21.
It was not the first time Leo had spoken about an international conflict. In his first Sunday message, he urged Gaza ceasefire and the release of hostages, as well as “No More War,” the “real and lasting peace” in Ukraine.
On May 21, he tackled the Gaza crisis in his audience every Sunday, insisting on “end hostility,” and asked Israel to allow humanitarian aid to the war-torn and poor enclaves.
Israel subsequently lifted the blockade and returned humanitarian trickle to Gaza.
Leo’s May 18th inauguration began swirling speculation about whether he would promote social justice and immigration rights, as did Frances.
Leo, a native of Chicago, lived for most of his adult life in Peru, but was the first American-born pope.
Some of Leo’s past social media posts criticized the Catholic Vice President J.D. Vance and the Trump administration for his hard-hitting immigration policies. Leo met personally with Secretary of State Marco Rubio and his wife Vance, the Vatican announced on May 19th.
Pope Francis Brand’s Gaza crisis is “serious and shameful”
Israel launched a siege of Gaza after extremists affiliated with Hamas, which controls the territory of the Israeli-Egypt border – on October 7, 2023, it overrunned the Israeli border, killing 1,200 people and taking around 250 hostages. Since then, more than 54,000 Palestinians have been killed in Israeli attacks, according to local health officials run by Hamas.
The ceasefire, which was mediated in mid-January, was crushed two months later. Since then, the Trump administration’s in-person meeting with Qatar’s Hamas has not been able to win a new deal.
On May 26, Israeli airstrikes killed at least 54 Palestinians evacuated at schools.
Pope Francis repeatedly called for a ceasefire in Gaza, repeating it in a message on Easter Sunday, a day before he passed away.
Some of his comments directly criticized Israel for the sacrifice of Palestinian civilians. In a message in January, he called the situation “very serious and shameful” and added, “We cannot accept civilian bombings.”
Throughout the conflict, Francis continued to intimate contact with the small Catholic community in Gaza, making nightly calls with the churches of numerous Muslim enclaves for the weeks leading up to his death.
