Lebanon asks Vatican to intervene for Christian villages after Israeli strike kills priest

Lebanon’s foreign minister is urging the Vatican to intervene to help protect Christian villages in southern Lebanon as fighting between Israel and the Iran-backed militant group Hezbollah intensifies.

Foreign Minister Youssef Raggi said March 10 that he spoke by phone with Archbishop Paul Gallagher, the Vatican’s secretary for relations with states, about the “difficult situation facing the border villages” in southern Lebanon.

“I asked the Holy See to intervene and mediate to help preserve the Christian presence in those villages,” Raggi said, “whose residents have always supported the Lebanese state and its official military institutions, and have never departed from this commitment.”

According to Raggi, Archbishop Gallagher said that the Holy See is “making all the necessary diplomatic contacts” to halt the escalation in Lebanon and prevent residents from being displaced from their homes. The archbishop added that Pope Leo XIV continues to pray for the country.

Since the onset of the U.S.-Israeli war with Iran, Israel has carried out strikes on suspected Hezbollah positions in southern Lebanon, Beirut’s southern suburbs, and the Bekaa Valley. The conflict has triggered widespread displacement, with the United Nations reporting March 9 that nearly 700,000 people across Lebanon have been forced from their homes and nearly 300 people have been killed.

Raggi’s request also comes one day after a Maronite Catholic priest, Father Pierre al-Rahi, was killed when an Israeli tank shell struck a home in the Christian-majority village of Qlayaa, located a few miles from the Israeli border. As Zeale News previously reported, Israel stated after the strike that its target had been Hezbollah fighters who had infiltrated the town. Qlayaa’s mayor denied that there were any such fighters in the town when Israel conducted its deadly operation.

Zeale News also reported that Fr. al-Rahi had decided to remain in the village with other clergy and residents despite an Israeli evacuation order that came as Hezbollah fighters staged counteroffensives. 

In a speech given three days before his death, Fr. al-Rahi said he and many local Christians were staying put “because these are our homes and we will not leave them.” He emphasized that “none of us carry any weapons” other than the “weapons of peace, goodness, love, prayer, and more prayer.” 

In a March 9 statement shared by Catholic journalist Edward Pentin, Pope Leo expressed “deep sorrow for all the victims of the recent bombings in the Middle East, for the many innocent people, including many children, and for those who were helping them, such as Father Pierre El-Rahi.”

Zeale News also reported that several residents have criticized the Lebanese army for failing to prevent Hezbollah fighters from infiltrating neutral villages near the Israeli border. Lebanese President Joseph Aoun has also accused both Israel and Hezbollah of attempting to “corner my country” over Iranian, Israeli, and U.S. interests. According to CNN, he said Israel has “no respect for the laws of war,” while Hezbollah places “no value on Lebanon’s interest nor on the life of its people.”