B’nai B’rith International, the world’s oldest and most widely known Jewish organization and one profoundly committed to interreligious harmony, is stunned and outraged by the reported citing of claims of “genocide” in Gaza by Pope Francis in a book expected to first be released in Italy and Spanish-speaking countries tomorrow.

“Hope Never Disappoints,” a volume being released by Hernán Reyes Alcaide and Edizioni Piemme publishers based on interviews with the pontiff in advance of the Catholic Church’s Jubilee 2025 year, focuses on pilgrims striving for a better world. In it, according to the Vatican’s official L’Osservatore Romano newspaper, the pope “reflects on the family and education, on the social, political and economic situation of the planet, on geopolitics and migration, on the climate crisis, new technologies and peace.” Published excerpts of the work include this text (in unofficial translation): “The still-open wound of the war in Ukraine led thousands of people to flee their homes, especially during the first months of the conflict. But we have also witnessed the unrestricted reception of many border countries, as in the case of Poland. Something similar has happened in the Middle East, where the open doors of nations like Jordan or Lebanon continue to be the salvation for millions of people fleeing the conflicts of the area: I think above all of those who leave Gaza in the midst of the famine that has hit the Palestinian brothers in the face of the difficulty of bringing food and aid to their territory. According to some experts, what is happening in Gaza has the characteristics of genocide.”

The pope continues, “Careful investigation should be done to determine whether it is part of the technical definition” of genocide “formulated by jurists and international bodies.”

B’nai B’rith CEO Daniel S. Mariaschin and Director of United Nations and Intercommunal Affairs David J. Michaels expressed alarm over the comments.

“Even putting aside the very fraught suggestion of current ‘famine’—itself an extreme, precise condition that has not materialized, and that has certainly been actively prevented in the overwhelming majority of Gaza by Israel’s facilitation of substantial food shipment and evacuations of civilians—Pope Francis’s mention of ‘some experts’ falsely accusing Israel of genocide is gratuitous and damaging,” they said. “The suffering of noncombatants in Gaza has been not just prompted but engineered by Hamas, while Israel has done more to try to limit harm to an enemy’s surrounding civilians than any party to warfare in history. The evidence is in the result: Consistent with over 75 years of Arab-Israeli conflict, and unlike actual genocides such as the Holocaust, 13 months of combat have not yielded mass civilian fatalities in Gaza relative to wars elsewhere.”

“Indeed,” they continued, “notwithstanding the complexity of circumstances in Gaza, atrocities elsewhere both over recent years and today continue to exact a graver, sometimes far graver, human toll. While we cannot yet read ‘Hope Never Disappoints’ in full, does it level a ‘genocide’ charge in these other contexts? Does it do so with regard to explicit Iran-led jihadist efforts to annihilate Israel, with terrible results for Jews and Arabs alike? If not, and if the accusers Pope Francis invokes do not, we are forced to grapple with whether excoriating Israel—which suffered Jews’ bloodiest day since the Holocaust on Oct. 7 last year—is the result not of impartial analysis but convenient and discriminatory global politics.”

B’nai B’rith, a devoted contributor to the vital friendship between Catholics and Jews around the world, will continue to assert that protecting the lives of Israel’s diverse citizens is a moral imperative—and that fairness and accuracy are essential to achieving lasting peace in the Middle East.