After one year of great suffering in the Middle East, here's how to help

(OSV News) -- Oct. 7 marks the grim one-year anniversary of the latest war in the Middle East, the date when the Hamas Palestinian terrorist organization attacked Israel out of the blue, killing nearly 1,200 and capturing 251 hostages. At the time, the outrage from the international community was loud and righteous.

In the months since that initial attack, escalation after escalation on multiple fronts has led to what Pope Francis has called "a spiral of violence" in the region, focusing dramatically on the Gaza Strip for almost a year and culminating most recently in Israeli airstrikes and attacks via bombs in handheld electronics in Lebanon and the launching of missiles at Israel by Iran.

Yet despite the severity of the ongoing war, which bears a larger death toll than previous conflicts in the decades-long Israeli-Palestinian battle, and despite the disturbing escalations, the newest conflict in the Middle East risks becoming "business as usual" white noise for the West -- with too many long-suffering civilians paying the steep price.

"As we approach the one-year mark, and as we look at statistics out of Gaza, the world has forgotten that there is a life behind every number," said Sami El-Yousef, CEO of the Latin Patriarchate of Jerusalem in his September reflection, after the death toll passed 40,000 in the Gaza Strip. On his way back from Asia Pope Francis said that "when you see the bodies of killed children ... a school is bombed -- this is ugly." And in July, U.N. Secretary General António Guterres said that the humanitarian situation in Gaza is "a moral stain on us all."

According to data published Sept. 18 by the U.N., 96% of the analyzed population of the Gaza Strip is facing crisis levels of food insecurity, water sources are compromised, hospitals are only partially functioning, and a shocking 17,000 children are unaccompanied or separated from families.

Over the summer, children in Gaza who had been spared death by bombing began dying from malnutrition, with devastating pictures being posted by news agencies of mothers mourning their children after watching them die slow and painful deaths.

Catholic charities such as Caritas, the Order of Malta and Catholic Relief Services are trying to assist as much as possible to Gaza through the delivery of aid kits with food and sanitary and medical supplies though the Catholic parish of the Holy Family and the Orthodox St. Porphyrios church. The patriarchate in Jerusalem is cooperating with parishes to provide help to Christians in the region, which is also being devastated by a lack of tourists. Despite this assistance, the humanitarian situation remains dire.

We must not forget, too, those individuals whose fates remain unknown. As of late September, 97 hostages taken by Hamas on Oct. 7, 2023, remain unaccounted for. At the funeral of Hersh Goldberg-Polin, whose body was recovered Aug. 31, his mother, Rachel, prayed that the death of her son "will be a turning point in this horrible situation in which we are all entangled."

In light of such great suffering, Catholics should respond to the plea of Cardinal Pierbattista Pizzaballa, Latin Patriarch of Jerusalem, and dedicate this Oct. 7 to prayer, penance and fasting.

"For the past year the Holy Land … has been plunged into a vortex of violence and hatred never seen or experienced before," Cardinal Pizzaballa wrote in a letter to his diocese Sept. 26. "The intensity and impact of the tragedies we have witnessed in the past twelve months have deeply lacerated our conscience and our sense of humanity."

While the cardinal called on leaders to "a commitment of justice and respect for every person’s right to freedom, dignity and peace," he also called on everyone to "commit ourselves to peace" through promoting "every action of peace, reconciliation and encounter" and through prayer, bringing "our desire for peace to God."

"We need to convert, to do penance, and to implore forgiveness," the cardinal said.

Cardinal Pizzaballa correctly directs our attention to the Blessed Mother, as the month of October has historically been dedicated to the Holy Rosary and Oct. 7 is the memorial of Our Lady of the Rosary. It is deeply appropriate to invoke the intercession of Our Lady, who is also our queen of peace, for an end to the suffering and conflict in the Holy Land, for who understands suffering better than she whose heart was pierced by a sword?

At the end of his homily at the Oct. 2 Mass opening the 2024 Synod of Bishops on Synodality, Pope Francis announced that he will go Oct. 6 to the Basilica of St. Mary Major in Rome to pray the rosary "for the gift of peace" and encouraged synod delegates to join him. He then joined Cardinal Pizzaballa in encouraging all people to "live a day of prayer and fasting for peace in the world" on Oct. 7.

One year into this terrible conflict, let us not forget all those who continue to suffer in the Middle East -- in the holiest of lands where Jesus himself walked. Let us work for an end to violence through prayer and fasting and by offering repentance for the ways in which we have failed to live and act with love. May peace reign in our hearts and in our world.