U.S. Cardinal Still Hopes to Meet Israel’s Leaders

Cardinal John J. O’Connor of New York said today he still hopes to meet with Israeli leaders within Vatican guidelines, which prohibit official recognition of the Jewish state.

The second day of the Roman Catholic churchman’s five-day visit was highlighted by an emotional stop at Yad Vashem, Israel’s monument to the 6 million Jews slain in the Nazi Holocaust.

He also went to the Israeli-occupied West Bank town of Bethlehem on a pilgrimage to the Church of the Nativity, built on the site where the Bible says Jesus was born nearly 2,000 years ago.

“I would very much like to meet with those gentlemen,” O’Connor said, alluding to Prime Minister Yitzhak Shamir, Foreign Minister Shimon Peres and President Chaim Herzog.

“I would be very grateful for an opportunity to meet with them in some situation in which I would not be violating my trust,” O’Connor said.

O’Connor on Thursday publicly apologized to Israel for his diplomatic gaffe in arranging and then canceling official meetings with political leaders.

He initially had planned to meet with Shamir, Peres and Herzog in their respective offices in Jerusalem, but was forced to cancel the meetings because of the Vatican’s policy on the status of Jerusalem.

The Vatican has informal diplomatic relations with Israel but does not officially recognize the Jewish state and Israel’s claim that Jerusalem is its capital.

The Vatican maintains that Jerusalem should be an international zone, with no claim of sovereignty by any nation.

The Vatican contended that a meeting between O’Connor and Israeli political leaders in their offices in Jerusalem would amount to de facto recognition of Jerusalem as Israel’s capital.