Qlayaa - Father Pierre El Raii, the Maronite parish priest of Qlayaa, in southern Lebanon, was killed today in a bombardment while trying to help a parishioner who had been injured in an initial attack. The priest, in his fifties, was struck by a further bombardment that hit the same house. Rushed to hospital, he died “after fifteen minutes”.
The news was confirmed by Father Toufic Bou Merhi, a Franciscan of the Custody of the Holy Land and parish priest of the Latin communities in Tyre and Deirmimas, who learned of his fellow priest’s death with deep shock. According to his account, the attack took place at 2 p.m. (Beirut time), one week after the start of the Israeli offensive against the country of the cedars. Father Pierre had rushed there with dozens of young people to help a man wounded in the first bombardment. While the group was trying to intervene, a second attack struck the same house. The parish priest was seriously injured and died shortly afterwards. His death has struck hard in an area already worn down by days of violence and repeated evacuation warnings.
In Father Toufic’s testimony, the portrait emerges of a priest who had chosen to remain beside his community. Father Pierre El Raii was regarded as a point of reference for the Christians of the area, especially at a time when many families are living with the uncertainty of having to leave everything behind. His presence had been a concrete source of support in a context marked by fear, precariousness and growing isolation. News of his killing has caused grief and dismay in the villages of the South. Many residents had so far chosen to stay, despite the threat of air raids. Now, however, perceptions have changed radically. To remain means exposing oneself every day to the risk of bombs; to leave means abandoning one’s home, one’s land, one’s family memory, often without sufficient means to find shelter. Meanwhile, the humanitarian emergency is worsening by the hour. In Beirut, there are around half a million displaced people, while almost three hundred thousand people have left the South of the country. Tens of thousands are also leaving the Bekaa. Reception facilities are under severe pressure and many people are sleeping in cars or on the streets. Lebanon is facing a mass flight involving a significant part of the population, placing further strain on the country’s already fragile resources.
At the convent in Tyre, entrusted to the Franciscans, around two hundred people are being housed, all of them Muslims. The priority remains offering shelter to those who arrive, without distinction, in a region where coexistence is being struck along with homes and people. In this context of devastation, the words coming from the ecclesial communities insist on the need not to give way to despair. The appeal remains to be able to live with dignity, to stop the war and the violence, and to break a spiral that continues to produce death, hatred and destruction. The death of Father Pierre El Raii gives this crisis a concrete face in the news: that of a priest who remained with his people to the very end and was struck down while trying to save a life.
In the evening, the Holy See Press Office stated: “Pope Leo XIV expresses deep sorrow for all the victims of the bombardments in the Middle East in recent days, for the many innocent people, including many children, and for those who were trying to help them, such as Father Pierre El-Rahi, a Maronite priest killed this afternoon in Qlayaa. The Pope is following events with concern and prays that all hostilities may cease as soon as possible.”