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Israeli president Shimon Peres (L) with Pope Benedict XVI at the Vatican last year.
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JERUSALEM (AFP)---Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert announced on Sunday that Pope Benedict XVI will visit the Holy Land in May in the first official confirmation of the trip.
"In May there will be an important visit, that of Pope Benedict XVI," the
premier said at the start of the weekly cabinet meeting.
"President Shimon Peres will accompany him during his visit and the prime
minister's office has been charged with organising the trip," Olmert said.
News reports said the visit would take place from May 8 to 14 and include
stops in Jerusalem, Nazareth and Bethlehem as well as the Jordanian capital
Amman.
The visit had been cast in doubt over comments made by Richard Williamson,
an ultra-conservative English bishop who has denied that Jews died in Nazi gas
chambers during the Holocaust in World War II.