The Israeli Prime Minister, Mr Ehud Barak, has described Pope John Paul's visit to his country as "an event of immense historic importance". Speaking to reporters after he had met the Pope for a short time at the Mount of the Beatitudes near Galilee yesterday, he said he believed the visit was "a major step towards reconciliation between the Jewish people and Christianity". It carried with it "a highly important message about peace", he said.
Mr Barak felt the visit had "helped make the atmosphere much better between Christians and Jews and [generally] in this region as regards the peace process". He explained that in his private meeting with Pope John Paul they had discussed "in detail, every situation in the peace process".
The meeting was held at the Mount of the Beatitudes after Pope John Paul celebrated a youth Mass. Afterwards, Mr Barak introduced his cabinet ministers to the Pope, and gifts were exchanged in a markedly friendly atmosphere. The Pope was relaxed and jovial and appeared to be more at home than at any time since he began the visit.
Today, the feast of the Annunciation, the Pope will celebrate Mass at the Basilica of the Annunciation in Nazareth. It was reported yesterday that one of Nazareth's Muslim leaders, Imam Fati Kichawi, had advised the Pope not to get involved in the controversy in the town over the building of a mosque near the basilica.
However, last night Imam Nazem Abuslween, who is leading the campaign to build the mosque, told me at the site that Imam Kichawi was not speaking for him or his colleagues. "He is not our voice," he said and as far as they were concerned Pope John Paul was welcome in Nazareth and at their mosque.
At the site last night, which is about 100 metres from the Basilica, men prayed in the open in the descending dark. The site had been used as a school and mosque since the late 12th century and was demolished by the Municipality of Nazareth in 1997 without consulting the town's 73 per cent Muslim majority, they said.
They had been praying at the site since and would continue doing so "forever", the imam said. Having secured permission to build from the Israeli authorities, they hoped to begin building the new mosque in a few months. Last December, the churches in Israel closed their doors for two days in protest at the plans to build the mosque so close to the basilica.
Imam Abuslween felt those protests were "not good, not neighbourly", but he believed they were now over. All they wanted was to be good neighbours to everybody, he said.
Yesterday morning, in what one Israeli paper predicted accurately, would be a "Catholic Woodstock", approximately 100,000 young people gathered in the mud for a youth Mass at the Mount of the Beatitudes. The weather conditions on Thursday night had raised fears that the event might have to be cancelled. But the rain stopped early yesterday morning, falling slightly in strong wind a couple of times during the Mass.
Young people lay on thin layers of plastic while waiting for the Pope, who was 50 minutes late. Sound was bad and only those close to the large altar could see what was going on.
The crowd represented young people from all over the world, including 95 from Ireland plus 15 adults, all members of the Neo Catechumenate movement, as were most of the young people.
Delivering what was the first sermon ever by a Pope on the mount and to the largest crowd which had ever gathered there, Pope John Paul welcomed the "young people of Israel, of the Palestinian territories, of Jordan and Cyprus; young people of the Middle East, of Africa and Asia, of Europe, America and Oceania. With love and affection I greet each one of you."
AFP reports from Jerusalem:
A TV journalist suspected of staging a cursing ceremony against Pope John Paul for the purpose of increasing ratings for his programme was put under house arrest for five days by an Israeli court yesterday. The ceremony, known in Aramaic as the pulsa de nura curse, was aired on Israel's Channel 2 television on Monday and by many foreign networks. Police are investigating allegations that it was a put-up job and that participants were paid by the journalist, Avishai Ben Haim.
Ben Haim, a researcher for the programme Mishal Ham, has denied that he had organised the event.
The ceremony has fallen into disuse in mainstream Jewish practice, but extremists performed it before the murder in Tel Aviv of the prime minister, Yitzhak Rabin, in November 1995.
