Pope: Reconciliation is only way to resolve Israeli-Palestinian conflict

By JERUSALEM POST STAFF
Pope Benedict XVI said Sunday that reconciliation was the only way to resolve the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, and said the entire world needed to rediscover hope to end wars, poverty and financial turmoil. In his Easter Sunday message, delivered from the central loggia of St. Peter's Basilica, Benedict noted that he plans to travel to the Holy Land in just a few weeks and said he would bring a message of hope and love to the region. "Reconciliation - difficult but indispensable - is a precondition for a future of overall security and peaceful coexistence, and it can only be achieved through renewed, persevering and sincere efforts to resolve the Israeli-Palestinian conflict," he said. Benedict delivered his "Urbi et Orbi" speech - Latin for "to the city and the world" - at the end of his Easter Sunday Mass, attended by tens of thousands of people who packed St. Peter's Square and the boulevard leading up to it.