Pope John Paul II and Judaism

He also visited the Holocaust memorial Yad Vashem in Israel in March 2000, and touched the holiest outward remaining shrine of the Jewish people, the Western Wall in Jerusalem.

"[9] In 1994, John Paul II established formal diplomatic relations between the Holy See and the State of Israel, acknowledging its centrality in Jewish life and faith.

This concert, which was conceived and conducted by American Maestro Gilbert Levine, was attended by the Chief Rabbi of Rome, the President of Italy, and survivors of the Holocaust from around the world.

Efforts at reconciliation took a step back when the Polish national Catholic bishops conferences supported the Carmelite Nuns in their attempt to establish a convent at the former World War II Nazi-run death camp located at Auschwitz, a very sensitive site in the memorial to the victims of the Holocaust.

The proposed location of this convent provoked hostility from some sectors of the Jewish community to the idea of building the Catholic institution on the ground where mass genocide of Jews was carried out.

In March 2000, John Paul II visited Yad Vashem, (the Israeli national Holocaust memorial) in Israel and later made history by touching a very holy site in Judaism, the Western Wall in Jerusalem,[13] placing a letter inside it (in which he prayed for forgiveness for the actions against Jews in the past).

[5][13][14][15] In part of his address he said: “I assure the Jewish people the Catholic Church ... is deeply saddened by the hatred, acts of persecution and displays of anti-Semitism directed against the Jews by Christians at any time and in any place”, he added that there were “no words strong enough to deplore the terrible tragedy of the Holocaust”.

He achieved far more in terms of transforming relations with both the Jewish people and the State of Israel than any other figure in the history of the Catholic Church”[5] “With Judaism, therefore, we have a relationship which we do not have with any other religion.