News Brief

-30/3/04

The Israeli Government's refusal to renew visas to Christian clergy in the Holy Land has precipitated a crisis with the entire Christian world, say church representatives.

It is estimated that hundreds of priests, nuns and Christian volunteers have not been granted permission to remain in Israel.

Israeli police now have the legal power to arrest and deport all in this category, although so far no church leader has reported that any staff have been forced to leave.

Recently, however a member of Christian Peacemaker Teams was denied re-entry to Israel.

In recent months several monks and nuns have also been held by Israeli immigration police for lacking legal authority to be in the country.

"It's a problem not only for the Catholic Church but for all (Christian) denominations in the Holy Land," a spokesman for the Apostolic Delegation, the Vatican's representatives in Jerusalem, told Ecumenical News International.

But Israel's refusal to grant residence visas to more than 130 Catholic Church delegates is straining relations with the Vatican, Dr. David Jaeger, the Franciscan spokesman in Israel, has said.

Foreign Ministry officials agree there is needless red tape in the Interior Ministry's handling of visa requests submitted by representatives of the Church. They said an intra-ministerial committee appointed by Prime Minister Ariel Sharon is looking into a solution to the problem.

Jaeger, spoking with Haaretz from Rome, said that for the first time since Israel was established, priests have been unable to renew their visas to stay in the country. The problem began two years ago, when Eli Yishai of Shas was Interior Minister, he said. Jaeger says Israeli officials told him at the time that the problem came from Shas' world view, and its fears that the Jewish character of the state was weakening.

However, Jaeger said, for the past year the Interior Ministry has been headed by the Shinui party and still the visa situation for the Catholic delegates has not improved. Minister Avraham Poraz had met with Church officials and promised to solve the problem, but every day visas of church delegates expire, Jaeger said.

Gadi Golan, the head of the Foreign Ministry's religions department, said police detained a Franciscan monk traveling on a bus to classes at Bar Ilan University. He was released after the Church's intervention. Jaeger said two nuns were also temporarily arrested. He expects such unpleasant incidents to become more frequent.

"In the Catholic world there is a growing view that Israel has deliberately framed a policy to hurt the Church," Jaeger said. "Nobody believes some clerk in the population registry is able to reach these decisions on his own."

Golan said Prime Minister Sharon has responded to the increasing number of complaints about visa extension request rejections. He asked officials from the National Security Council to head the intra-ministerial committee which is to formulate clear rules for the visa extensions.