Pope Leo travels to Lebanon on Sunday, where he is expected to appeal for peace in a country that is a continued target of Israeli air strikes, on the second and final leg of his first overseas trip as leader of the Catholic Church.
The first US pope will arrive from Turkey, where he has been visiting for four days and warned that humanity’s future was at risk because of the world’s unusual number of bloody conflicts, condemning violence in the name of religion.
Leo is due to land at Beirut’s Hariri International Airport at 3.45pm, ahead of meetings with the president and prime minister and an address to national leaders, the pope’s second to a foreign government.
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Lebanon, which has the largest share of Christians in the Middle East, has been rocked by the spillover of the Gaza conflict, as Israel and the Lebanese Shiite Muslim militant group Hezbollah went to war, culminating in a devastating Israeli offensive.
Leaders in Lebanon, which hosts 1 million Syrian and Palestinian refugees and is also struggling to recover from years of economic crisis, are worried Israel will dramatically escalate its strikes in coming months.
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Hezbollah leader Naim Qassem said on Friday that he hoped Pope Leo XIV’s visit would help bring an end to Israeli attacks.
Lebanon’s diverse communities have also welcomed the papal trip, with leading Druze cleric Sheikh Sami Abi al-Muna saying Lebanon “needs the glimmer of hope represented by this visit”.