CATHOLICS BERATE JEWISH CONDUCT IN HOLY CITY

Gisborne Herald, Volume LXXV, Issue 22657, 7 June 1948, Page 5

CATHOLICS BERATE JEWISH CONDUCT IN HOLY CITY

;«0 a.m.) LONDON, June 6. The heads of the Catholic communities in Jerusalem today released the text of a telegram they sent *o the Vatican protesting against Jewish activities in the Holy City. The telegram said that protests to the three-man consular truce committee as well as to representatives of the International Red Cross had failed to yield results. The telegram was submitted for the "Holy See’s information and considera tion.”

It also says: '‘The Arab forces kept their promise to respect holy places, convents and Red Cross institutions. If they occupied a certain convent, it was only to protect the Holy City against the Jewish attackers trying to penetrate and spread death and destruction."

Two officials of the Latin Patriarchate in 'the Holy City and Franciscan Fathers who are guarding the holy places discussed the situation in Jerusalem with King Abdullah today. The Franciscan friars delivered notes to the embassies in Rome today announcing that they intended to raise a militia of Christian volunteers to guard Palestine’s holy places, says the New York Herald Tribune's correspondent in Rome. The Franciscans said that the 408 brothers of their order at present in Palestine are no longer able to guarantee the security of holy places and need between 500 and 1000 armed men ot all nationalities to assist them. The friars who announced the plan are members of the Franciscan “Holy Land delegation” which has been safeguarding Christian sacred places in Palestine since the thirteenth century.