VATICAN CITY: Pope Leo XIV held his first meeting with Palestinian president Mahmud Abbas on Thursday, where the Vatican said they discussed the “urgent need” to help the civilian population in Gaza.

The visit comes almost a month into a fragile ceasefire between Hamas and Israel, following two years of war triggered by the Palestinian group’s October 7, 2023, attack.

Abbas is the longtime head of the Palestinian Authority, which exerts limited control over parts of the West Bank. His Fatah movement is the rival to Hamas, which took control of Gaza in 2007.Abbas and Leo spoke by telephone in July but Thursday was their first in-person meeting since the American took over as head of the world’s 1.4 billion Catholics in May.

“During the cordial talks, it was recognized that there is an urgent need to provide assistance to the civilian population in Gaza and to end the conflict by pursuing a two-state solution,” the Vatican said in a statement afterwards.It noted that the meeting came 10 years after the Holy See formally recognized the state of Palestine through an agreement signed in 2015.

Abbas met several times with Leo’s predecessor, Pope Francis, who died in April.In the final months of his pontificate, Francis hardened his rhetoric against Israel’s assault on Gaza, but his successor has so far adopted a more measured tone.

Leo has expressed his solidarity with Gaza and denounced the forced displacement of Palestinians, but said the Holy See could not describe what was happening as a “genocide.”On Wednesday afternoon, Abbas laid flowers at Francis’s tomb at the Rome basilica of Santa Maria Maggiore.

“I cannot forget what he did for Palestine and the Palestinian people,” Abbas told reporters.In 2014, then-Israeli president Shimon Peres and Abbas joined a prayer for peace with Pope Francis at the Vatican, planting an olive tree together.

Abbas will on Friday meet with Italian Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni.cmk-ar/ams/yad