The Pope “prays that this pointless slaughter will awaken consciences, lead to a change of heart, and inspire all parties to lay down their arms and take up the path of dialogue.”
Does he really think that after murdering four nuns that the Islamic State will have an awakening of conscience and enter into “dialogue” with Catholics? Does he realistically have any hope of that? If he does, and isn’t just mouthing nonsense for lack of anything better to say, his hope is based on false premises: he refuses to acknowledge that the Islamic State bases its activities on the Qur’an and Sunnah, and insists that Islam teaches peace, and so he assumes that if the Islamic State jihadis started listening to the better angels of their nature, they would lay down their arms and start chatfests with Catholics.
All the leaders of the Western world share this delusion, but reality will inevitably break through.
“Pope Francis condemns ‘diabolical’ attack on Yemen aged care home; authorities blame Islamic State group,” AFP, March 5, 2016 (thanks to Peter):
Yemeni authorities have blamed the Islamic State group for an attack on an aged care home run by missionaries that killed 16 people and was condemned by Pope Francis as “diabolical”.
Rival jihadist movement Al-Qaeda distanced itself from the mass shooting in the main southern city of Aden, saying it was not responsible.
Four gunmen stormed the facility in Aden’s Sheikh Othman district on Friday, killing a guard before tying up and shooting employees, security officials said.
Screams of elderly residents echoed from the home during the shooting rampage, witnesses said.
Among the dead were four nuns, who were working as nurses.
“His Holiness Pope Francis was shocked and profoundly saddened to learn of the killing of four Missionaries of Charity [nuns] and 12 others at a home for the elderly in Aden,” the Vatican’s Secretary of State Pietro Parolin said.
“He sends the assurance of his prayers for the dead and his spiritual closeness to their families and to all affected from this act of senseless and diabolical violence,” Cardinal Parolin said in a statement.
While security officials initially said they were Indian, the Vatican missionary news agency Fides later identified them as two Rwandans, a Kenyan and an Indian, adding that the mother superior managed to hide and survive.
The Argentine pontiff “prays that this pointless slaughter will awaken consciences, lead to a change of heart, and inspire all parties to lay down their arms and take up the path of dialogue,” Parolin said.
“He calls upon all parties in the present conflict to renounce violence, and to renew their commitment to the people of Yemen, particularly those most in need, whom the sisters and their helpers sought to serve,” he added.
An unnamed Yemeni presidency source in Riyadh said that those behind such “treacherous terrorist acts” were individuals who have “sold themselves to the devil,” in a statement on the official sabanew.net website.
“There was no trace of these groups, which go under the name of the Islamic State or Daesh” when pro-government forces were battling the Huthi rebels and their allies to push them out of Aden last year, the source said, accusing them of “switching roles” with the Iran-backed rebels.
In a statement addressed to the residents of Aden, Al-Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula (AQAP), also known as Ansar al-Sharia, denied “any links to the attack on the elderly care home”….