The committee of former Lebanese Prisoners in Israel filed an information notice on Tuesday against the Patriarchal Maronite Vicar of Haifa and Jerusalem, Archbishop Moussa el-Hage, and the Patriarchal Vicar of the Syriac Catholic Church for the Holy Land, Archbishop Camille Semaan, for “communicating with the Israeli army.”
The two Lebanese clerics, along with a delegation of Jerusalem church leaders, took part in the annual holiday greetings ceremony on December 21, organized by Israeli President Isaac Herzog, in the presence of Israeli Defense Minister Yoav Gallant.
El-Hage and Semaan are thus accused of making contact with Israeli officials who are, according to the committee, in violation of “the laws in force, which prohibit any normalization of relations with Israel.”
We recall that Mgr el-Hage was already the subject of a defamatory campaign back in July 2022. He was arrested at the Naqoura border crossing by the Security Forces, who interrogated him for over eleven hours before releasing him following the intervention of ecclesiastical and judicial authorities. He was accused of “transporting money and medicines from Lebanese refugees in Israel to their relatives in Lebanon.” His arrest caused a stir in religious and political circles, with Lebanese officials considering it to be a means of exerting pressure on the Maronite patriarch, Cardinal Bechara al-Rai in reaction to his “patriotic” positions, to “incite him to change his views.”
