The Vatican has defended Pope Benedict XVI amid growing Israeli criticism of his speech at the country's national Holocaust memorial.
Israeli critics have complained the German-born pope failed to explicitly mention Nazis or Germans in Monday's speech. They say he also didn't mention his past as a Hitler Youth movement member.
The Rev. Federico Lombardi, the Vatican spokesman, told reporters Tuesday that the pope "can't mention everything every time he speaks."
The spokesman claimed Benedict was never in the Hitler Youth. However, the pope, then Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger, said in a 1997 book he was forced into the movement.
The pope pledged to remember the 6 million Jews killed in the Holocaust upon arriving in Israel on Monday.
THIS IS A BREAKING NEWS UPDATE. Check back soon for further information. AP's earlier story is below.
JERUSALEM (AP) — Pope Benedict XVI took his message of peace to the most contentious site in the Israeli-Palestinian conflict on Tuesday, urging both sides to engage in "a sincere dialogue aimed at building a world of justice and peace."
On the second day of his Holy Land tour, the pope visited the Dome of the Rock, where Muslims believe the Prophet Muhammad ascended to heaven, and the adjacent Western Wall, revered by Jews as a remnant of the ancient Temple in Jerusalem.
Competing claims to the hilltop compound — known to Muslims as the Noble Sanctuary and Jews as the Temple Mount — have sparked violence in the past. Resolving the dispute has been the most intractable issue during more than 15 years of on-and-off Israeli-Palestinian peace negotiations.
"In a world sadly torn by divisions, this sacred place serves as a stimulus, and also challenges men and women of goodwill to work to overcome misunderstandings and conflicts of the past and set out on the path of a sincere dialogue aimed at building a world of justice and peace for coming generations," the pope said during a meeting with the top Islamic cleric in Jerusalem, Mohammed Hussein.
Hussein said afterward he gave the pope a letter complaining about Israeli policies in Jerusalem and appealing for the Vatican's help in bringing about Palestinian independence.
"We reiterate to you that peace and stability in this country ... can only be achieved with the end of occupation and with our Palestinian people regaining their freedom, their right to self-determination and their other legitimate rights," said the letter.
Benedict angered many in the Muslim world three years ago when he quoted a medieval text that characterized some of Islam's Prophet Muhammad's teachings as "evil and inhuman," particularly "his command to spread by the sword the faith."
He later expressed regret that his comments offended Muslims and spent three days in Jordan before coming to Israel as part of his outreach to the Islamic world.
Before meeting with Hussein, Benedict visited the mosque at the Dome of the Rock, the most sacred Muslim shrine in Jerusalem and part of the compound that is Islam's third-holiest site. He removed his red shoes before entering as a sign of respect, and a priest helped him slip them back on as he left.
At one point, Palestinian activists released hundreds of red, green and black balloons over the Old City, representing the colors of the Palestinian flag. One cluster of balloons held a Palestinian flag, the other the yellow and white Vatican flag. The pope was inside meeting the cleric and did not see the colorful display.
Following tradition, Benedict inserted a note between the ancient crevices of the Western Wall, the last remnant of the second of two biblical temples and Judaism's holiest shrine. As he placed his note in the wall, a popular custom among visitors to the site, Benedict was flanked by the wall's rabbi and two Catholic clergymen.
The written blessing asked "the God of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob" to "hear the cry of the afflicted, the fearful, the bereft; send your peace upon this Holy Land, upon the Middle East, upon the entire human family."
Later Tuesday, the pope told Israel's two chief rabbis that the Catholic Church is "irrevocably committed" to "a genuine and lasting reconciliation between Christians and Jews."
The pope's relations with Jews have occasionally been strained. He drew criticism for a recent decision to lift the excommunication of a Holocaust-denying bishop, Richard Williamson, and there have been differences of opinion over whether wartime Pope Pius XII did enough to save Jews during the Holocaust.
Benedict has acknowledged mistakes were made in handling the Williamson case, and the Vatican has said he must repudiate his views if he wants to be a Roman Catholic clergyman.
One of the rabbis, Yona Metzger, said he was glad that Benedict has not allowed Williamson to rejoin the clergy.
"If he had not reconsidered, it would have been a message to that same Holocaust denier in Iran that he too can carry out a Holocaust," said Metzger, referring to statements by Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, who has questioned whether the Nazi genocide took place.
Metzger also said he was glad the pope called anti-Semitism "not only a sin against Jews but against God."
Jews suffered centuries of persecution at the hands of the church, which traditionally held them responsible for rejecting and killing Jesus. Beginning with the modernizing reforms of the Second Vatican Council in the 1960s, the church officially disavowed that view, rejected anti-Semitism and started dialogue with other religions.
Benedict's predecessor, Pope John Paul II, made huge strides in the relationship, asking forgiveness on several occasions, including during his landmark 2000 trip to Israel, for the wrongs inflicted by Christians on Jews.
On Tuesday, Benedict also visited the traditional site of the Last Supper, which is at the center of a property dispute between Israel and the church. He then attended prayers at the Latin Patriarchate of Jerusalem, where some 400 clergy and local Catholics sang in Latin, Arabic and Italian.
The pope planned to celebrate Mass with thousands of followers in the Kidron Valley, facing the Mount of Olives and the site where Christianity says Jesus was arrested.
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