Robert Prevost’s nomination as the new pope was greeted with cheers in St. Peter’s Square. He will go by the name Pope Leo XIV. Virginia Pietromarchi, a journalist for Al Jazeera, was present in the Al Jazeera square with people who praised his peace and unity message.
The announcement that US Cardinal Robert Prevost has been named Pope Leo XIV has caused excitement tinged with hope around the world, with leaders from numerous countries offering their congratulations.
The elevation of Prevost, the first person from the United States to ascend to the highest position in the Catholic Church, has also sparked discussion about what his tenure could mean for the church’s leadership on a host of issues, among them immigration, war, poverty and inequality.
The new pope has previously posted social media criticisms of US Vice President JD Vance.
JD Vance is wrong: Jesus doesn’t ask us to rank our love for others https://t.co/hDKPKuMXmu via @NCRonline
The late Pope Francis, in his final hours, had met Vance, and is said to have chastised him on the administration’s efforts against migrants and the poor.
Pope Francis was also a staunch advocate for Palestinians and kept in regular contact with Catholics in Gaza amid Israel’s assault. Pope Leo XIV has not said much publicly about Gaza, making it unclear if he will emulate his predecessor.
Gaza’s tiny Christian community told Reuters news agency that they were happy about the election of the new pope, adding they were also confident he would give importance to the war-ravaged enclave like Francis did.
Here are a few of the reactions that world leaders have offered so far:
President Javier Milei: “The forces of Heaven have clearly given their verdict. No more words, Mr. Judge. End.”
President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva: “I would like to greet the American Cardinal Robert Prevost, chosen today to lead the destiny of the Catholic Church, with the name of Leo XIV. I hope he continues the legacy of Pope Francis, whose main virtues were the incessant search for peace and social justice, the defense of the environment, dialogue with all peoples and all religions, and respect for the diversity of human beings. We do not need wars, hatred and intolerance. We need more solidarity and more humanism. We need love for our neighbor, which is the basis of Christ’s teachings. May Pope Leo XIV bless us and inspire us in our ongoing quest to build a better and more just world.”
President Gustavo Petro: “The new Pope, Leo XIV, is more than just an American. His immediate ancestors are Latin: Spanish and French, and he lived for forty years in our Latin America, in Peru. I hope he becomes a great leader for migrant peoples around the world, and I hope he encourages our Latin American migrant brothers and sisters, humiliated today in the U.S. It’s time for them to organize. May it help us build the great force of humanity that defends life and defeats the greed that has caused the climate crisis and the extinction of all living things. Chicago is the great working-class and progressive city of the United States. I feel hopeful.”
President Emmanuel Macron: “A historic moment for the Catholic Church and its millions of faithful. To Pope Leo XIV, and to all Catholics in France and around the world, I extend a message of fraternity. On this May 8th, may this new pontificate be one of peace and hope.”
Prime Minister Viktor Orban: “We have a pope! There is hope!”
Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni: “I extend my most sincere wishes to Pope Leo XIV for the beginning of his pontificate. In a time marked by conflict and unrest, his words from the Loggia delle Benedizioni are a powerful call for peace, brotherhood and responsibility. A spiritual legacy that follows the path traced by Pope Francis, and that Italy looks at with respect and hope.”
President Joseph Aoun: “We pray to God to grant him health, well-being, and wisdom to lead the Church during this important phase of its history.”
President Claudia Sheinbaum: “We congratulate His Holiness Leo XIV, elected by the College of Cardinals as Head of Vatican City State and spiritual leader of the Catholic Church. I reaffirm our humanist convergence for world peace and prosperity.”
President Dina Boluarte: “President Dina Boluarte, on behalf of the Government and people of Peru, fraternally greets His Holiness Leo XIV, the new Pope of the Catholic Church. His election fills our nation, which was his home, his mission and his faith, with pride and hope. May his pontificate be a guide of peace, justice and love for the world.”
In a statement, the Qatari Diwan said the Emir, Sheikh Tamim bin Hamad Al Thani, had sent a “cable of congratulations” to Pope Leo.
President Vladimir Putin: “Please accept my heartfelt congratulations on your election as Pope. I am confident that the constructive dialogue and cooperation established between Russia and the Vatican will continue to develop on the basis of the Christian values that unite us. I wish you, Your Holiness, success in fulfilling the high mission entrusted to you, as well as good health and well-being.”
President Cyril Ramaphosa: “The election of Pope Leo XIV is a profound moment for the Catholic Church as well as the global community who followed this solemn event with hopeful anticipation. May the ceremonial white smoke that signalled the consensus of the Conclave prevail over the dark plumes of military bombardments affecting various regions of the world today. Pope Leo XIV’s early emphasis on peace is a call that resonates with most of humanity and is one that honours the legacy of the late Pope Francis. South Africa wishes Pope Leo XIV a blessed and transformative papacy that will strengthen faith, unity and social solidarity in the world.”
Prime Minister Pedro Sanchez: “Congratulations to the whole Catholic Church on the election of the new Pope Leo XIV. May his pontificate contribute to strengthening dialogue and the defense of human rights in a world in need of hope and unity.”
Ukraine
President Volodymyr Zelenskyy: “In this decisive moment for our country, we hope for further moral and spiritual support from the Vatican for Ukraine’s efforts aimed at restoring justice and achieving a lasting peace.”
Prime Minister Keir Starmer: “The election of Pope Leo XIV is a deeply profound moment of joy for Catholics in the United Kingdom and around globally, and begins a new chapter for the leadership of the church and in the world. Pope Leo is the first American Pope. This is a momentous moment. As Pope Francis’ papacy showed, the Holy See has a special role to play in bringing people and nations together to address the major issues of our time; especially on climate change, alleviating poverty and promoting peace and justice across the world.”
Secretary-General Antonio Guterres: “I extend my heartfelt congratulations to His Holiness Pope Leo XIV and Catholics around the world. The election of a new Pope is a moment of profound spiritual significance for millions of faithful around the world, and it comes at a time of great global challenges. Our world is in need of the strongest voices for peace, social justice, human dignity and compassion. I look forward to building on the long legacy of cooperation between the United Nations and the Holy See – nurtured most recently by Pope Francis – to advance solidarity, foster reconciliation, and build a just and sustainable world for all. It is rooted in the first words of Pope Leo. Despite the rich diversity of backgrounds and beliefs, people everywhere share a common goal: May peace be with all the world.”
President Donald Trump: “Congratulations to Cardinal Robert Francis Prevost, who was just named Pope. It is such an honor to realize that he is the first American Pope. What excitement, and what a Great Honor for our Country. I look forward to meeting Pope Leo XIV. It will be a very meaningful moment!”
Vice President JD Vance: “Congratulations to Leo XIV, the first American Pope, on his election! I’m sure millions of American Catholics and other Christians will pray for his successful work leading the Church. May God bless him!”
Muridke, Pakistan – The roof of the building sagged dangerously, sunlight peeked through a hole, while the ground below was littered with debris, and the doors of the rooms had been blown in by the blast.
This was India’s message to Pakistan, the outcome of one of a series of missile strikes launched in the early hours of May 7 as retribution for the deadly attack on tourists in Pahalgam, Indian-administered Kashmir, on April 22, in which 26 people were killed. India blamed Pakistan for that attack, but Islamabad has denied any involvement.
The Indian strike on Muridke was a part of Operation Sindoor, the most expansive set of aerial attacks on Pakistan outside the four wars that the nuclear-armed neighbours have fought. And of all the sites targeted by India, it was particularly significant.
Muridke has long been believed to be home to the Lashkar-e-Taiba (LeT) armed group, which India and other countries have blamed for carrying out deadly attacks on Indian soil, including the November 2008 attacks in Mumbai.
But while Indian security officials and the country’s Foreign Secretary Vikram Misri insisted on Wednesday that they struck “terrorist infrastructure” and that Indian missiles only hit armed groups, Pakistan has said that 31 civilians, including at least two children, were killed.
In Muridke, hours after the missile strike, the low-hanging roof belonged to the administrative block of a large compound called the Government Health and Educational Complex. The compound houses a hospital, two schools, a hostel, and a large seminary, with more than 3,000 students studying at various institutions, including the seminary. The compound also included 80 residences, homes to approximately 300 people, most of whom are government employees.
On Wednesday, the administrative block was struck, as was a mosque separated by a large veranda. Three men, all between the ages of 20 and 30 and part of the clerical staff, died in the attack, and one person was injured.
A rescue official at the site told Al Jazeera he had arrived within half an hour of the attack. “I was the one who discovered the first body,” he said, pointing to a room inside the administration block.
A small city of just more than 250,000 people, Muridke is four hours away from Islamabad, and located roughly 30km (18 miles) from Lahore, the provincial capital of Punjab, which borders India.
Tauseef Hasan, a government official, told Al Jazeera that Muridke was the first location struck by Indian missiles that night.
“It was just a few minutes after midnight when I heard two massive booms, within two minutes. We had already been preparing for this, and I knew exactly what had happened,” Hasan said in a matter-of-fact tone.
Across the veranda stood the mosque, Jamia Ummul Qurah, with a large prayer hall where part of the roof had collapsed. Two gaping holes in the ceiling marked the spots where missiles had struck.
Hasan and his colleague Usman Jalees said that after the Pahalgam attack two weeks earlier, Pakistani authorities had assessed the risk of an attack on Muridke, given the rhetoric against the town and compound, which India has long argued was the headquarters of the LeT.
“We had been informed that Muridke could be a target, and that is why we had instructed the staff and residents of the compound to vacate and leave the place,” Jalees told Al Jazeera, adding that those killed were part of the skeleton staff who had remained behind.
On one side of the veranda, a large table displayed pieces of the missile that had struck the buildings. The smell of explosives and residual heat still clung to the metal fragments.
While both Hasan and Jalees insisted that the seminary and educational institutions were fully under state control, the compound’s origins tell a more complex story.
![The main hall of the mosque which was also struck by missile. [Abid Hussain/Al Jazeera]](https://www.aljazeera.com/wp-content/uploads/2025/05/PXL_20250507_120537182-1746709366.jpg?w=770&resize=770%2C580&quality=80)
The compound was founded in 1988 by Hafiz Saeed, the founder of Jamaat-ud-Dawa (JuD), a charity organisation widely considered to be a front for the LeT. The compound’s seminary, Jamia Dawa Islami, was also named after the group.
India accuses Saeed and the LeT of orchestrating several attacks on its territory, most notably the 2008 Mumbai attacks that left more than 160 people dead over several days.
Abid Hussain, a 51-year-old religious scholar who lives on the compound, vehemently denied Indian claims that the area served as a “training facility” or “headquarters of any terrorist outfit.”
“This compound has always been an educational centre for children, both boys and girls. I have been teaching here myself, having lived here for the past three decades,” the short, stocky man with a forked beard told Al Jazeera.
The religious teacher went on to challenge accusations that the area was used for training fighters.
“If we have grounds and facilities to give opportunities to our students to learn swimming, or horse-riding, or physical training, how does this imply this is training the terrorists?” he asked.
The Pakistani government took over the facility from the JuD in 2019, at a time when the country was under international pressure to crack down on Saeed and the LeT or be placed on a “grey list” of countries deemed as not doing enough to stop financing for banned armed groups.
![Pieces of the missiles were also kept for display which smelt of explosives and radiated heat. [Abid Hussain/Al Jazeera]](https://www.aljazeera.com/wp-content/uploads/2025/05/PXL_20250507_121720146-1746709444.jpg?w=770&resize=770%2C580&quality=80)
Behind the mosque is a street where two houses had been completely destroyed. Solar panels and broken bricks were strewn everywhere.
Recalling the night of the attack, a resident, Ali Zafar, pointed to his residence behind one of the demolished buildings. He said the blast could be heard at least seven kilometres (four miles) away, near the house of a relative where he had moved with his family.
“A few days ago, the authorities told us to vacate the place, so we had moved outside the complex. It was certain that India would attack this area, as their media kept highlighting Muridke,” said Zafar, bearded and wearing glasses.
Hasan, the government official, said that, while the seminary and schools had closed for the academic year, the entire facility was under strict government supervision.
“Once the government took over the administration of the institute in 2019, we have ensured that the curriculum and teaching is completely supervised,” he said.
Hussain, the religious teacher, added that Saeed had stopped coming to the compound since the government took control.
“He used to be a regular back in the late ’90s and early 2000s,” he said.
A documentary film has shed new light on how the administration of United States President Joe Biden responded to the killing of Al Jazeera journalist Shireen Abu Akleh, suggesting Washington had evidence indicating her shooting death was likely intentional.
An Israeli sniper fatally shot Abu Akleh nearly three years ago while she reported from the Jenin refugee camp in the Israeli-occupied West Bank on May 11, 2022.
The new film — a 40-minute investigative documentary from the Washington, DC-based media company Zeteo — was released on Thursday just ahead of the anniversary of her death.
Under the title Who Killed Shireen?, the documentary explores not only who pulled the trigger but why justice has been so elusive in Abu Akleh’s case. It also offers the clearest picture yet of the Biden administration’s political manoeuvring as public pressure mounted for accountability.
Abu Akleh was a US citizen, and during her final reporting assignment, she wore both a helmet and a blue vest clearly labelled with the word “press” to indicate her status as a journalist.
In the aftermath of her killing, the Biden administration faced pressure to investigate the circumstances of her death and whether the shooting was intentional.
But while the administration initially called for an “independent, credible investigation”, it shifted its stance as the months progressed. It walked back calls for the killer to be “prosecuted” and eventually described the shooting as “the result of tragic circumstances”.
It also eased its scrutiny of the Israeli military, calling for accountability only in the form of a review of its “rules of engagement”.
The documentary Who Killed Shireen? features interviews from former Washington insiders about why the Biden administration made such a pivot. Its most damaging testimony comes from an anonymous official, who spoke with his face and voice obscured.
In the film, the official claims the evidence available to the Biden administration indicated that Abu Akleh’s death “was an intentional killing”. He said that assessment was based on the “visual capabilities of that day” and the distance between the Israeli snipers and the journalists who were shot.
Another journalist, Ali al-Samoudi, was also wounded at the same time as Abu Akleh, though he survived his gunshot.
“Whether or not they knew it was her [Abu Akleh] or not can very well be debated, but they would have absolutely known it was a media person or a noncombatant at a minimum that [the Israeli soldier] shot and killed,” the anonymous Biden official said.
He added that it was his “belief” that the shooter would have been able to see Abu Akleh’s blue “press” jacket.
The official acknowledged the shift in the Biden administration’s position, from viewing the shooting as “an intentional killing” to describing it as “a tragic accident”. He linked that about-face to the historically close ties the US has shared with Israel.
“Ultimately, I think what it came down to was different pressure within the administration to not try to anger the government of Israel too much, by trying to force their hand at saying they intentionally killed a US citizen,” the official said.
Another former US official, Andrew Miller, also spoke to filmmakers as part of the documentary. Miller served as the deputy secretary of state for Israeli-Palestinian Affairs from 2022 to 2024, and he indicated that the Biden administration had not been forthcoming about the stonewalling it faced from the Israeli government.
He said the government of then-Israeli Prime Minister Naftali Bennett refused to allow the US access to the soldier who fired the fatal shot, even for “informal” questioning.
Miller also cast doubt on Israeli claims that Abu Akleh was shot during a crossfire with Palestinian fighters. He explained that the Biden administration had information from the start that contradicted those claims.
“The fact that the official Israeli position remains that this was a case of crossfire … [that] the entire episode was a mistake — as opposed to potentially a mistake in identification or the deliberate targeting of this individual — points to, I think, a broader policy of seeking to manage the narrative,” Miller said.
The Biden administration had never publicly contradicted Israel’s assessment. Instead, when the Israeli military released its final report on the killing in September 2022, it said it “welcomed” the assessment.
That report asserted that Abu Akleh was “accidentally hit” by an Israeli bullet “during an exchange of fire in which life-risking, widespread and indiscriminate shots were fired toward” Israeli soldiers.
To date, the US government has never declassified a State Department report on the killing or confirmed media reports that the Department of Justice was conducting a separate probe.
Rights groups, press freedom organisations, and lawmakers have long called the Biden administration’s response inadequate, appealing for greater transparency and for the US to withhold aid to the military unit responsible.
Advocates said the latest revelations underscore a continued cycle of impunity.
African nations are drowning in debt. A halt of US aid to many countries on the continent could worsen the crisis.
Africa is a continent rich in natural resources with a young population. African nations in theory have the potential to transform their economies. But many of them are facing mountains of debt.
Africa’s external debt climbed to more than $650bn last year.
More than half of African countries are either in debt distress or teetering on the edge. But credit restructuring is painstakingly slow, and many governments end up spending more on servicing their debt than on healthcare or education.
A new documentary claiming to have uncovered the name of the Israeli soldier responsible for shooting Al Jazeera correspondent Shireen Abu Akleh has been released online.
Abu Akleh, a Palestinian American who had been with Al Jazeera since 1997, was killed while reporting from Jenin in the occupied West Bank in May 2022.
Shortly after her death, Israeli officials and media suggested she had been killed by Palestinian gunfire.
However, subsequent reports from human rights organisations and news agencies showed that the Palestinian fighters initially accused by Israel were some distance from Abu Akleh’s killing and, in September, Israel conceded there was a “high probability” its forces had “accidentally” killed the correspondent.
Contributors to the documentary, Who Killed Shireen? released on Thursday by Zeteo, suggested that Abu Akleh’s killing has helped further embolden a sense of impunity among Israeli soldiers, which has since contributed to the killing of more than 200 journalists by the Israeli military and settlers in the West Bank.
Here are four of the key takeaways from the investigation:
According to numerous testimonies featured in the film, officials within the Biden administration either knew or suspected that Abu Akleh had been shot by an Israeli soldier, but continued to support Israeli claims that she had been killed by Palestinians.
The filmmakers also claim that US officials had been informed by an unnamed Israeli general responsible for the West Bank within hours of Abu Akleh’s killing that one of his soldiers had likely shot her.
Despite this, US officials continued to support public Israeli accounts of Abu Akleh’s killing that attempted to shift the blame, and then, when Israel publicly admitted the likely culpability of one of its soldiers, that the killing was unintentional.
US officials did not publicly dispute that narrative, and instead said they were unable to determine if a crime had been committed without access to the shooter, which Israel refused to allow.
Speaking to reporter Dion Nissenbaum, one anonymous staffer within the former administration of President Joe Biden said that officials declined to press the Israeli administration on killing one of their citizens for fear of “anger]ing] the Israeli government”.
This is despite officials having concluded, the same source said, that Abu Akleh’s killing had been an intentional act.
Interviewed in the documentary, Eyal Hulata, who was Israel’s national security adviser at the time of the killing, defended Israel’s decision not to release the suspected soldier for questioning by the United States, saying that Israel had a “very good and trustworthy investigative mechanism”.
Asked if he could ever remember the subject of the US journalist’s murder arising in discussions between President Biden and Naftali Bennett, who was Israeli prime minister at the time, Hulala replies, “This wasn’t a topic between the prime minister and the president”.
Further requests from the Biden administration that Israel change the rules of engagement that some felt had led to Abu Akleh’s death met, according to one interviewee, “the brush off”.
The failure of the Biden administration to hold Israel to account or bring about a change to its rules of engagement after Abu Akleh’s murder has, US Senator Chris Van Hollen told filmmakers, contributed towards “the deaths of … other Americans and other civilians”.
The film reports that, according to soldiers active that day, Abu Akleh was killed by Alon Scagio, a sniper with the Israeli military’s elite “Duvdevan” unit.
Speaking of his response to having killed the journalist, despite her identity as a member of the press being clear, a friend of Scagio says he didn’t “remember anything special” about Abu Akleh’s killing, “so it wasn’t, like, an issue. He wasn’t happy, like, ‘ Hey, I killed a journalist, ‘ of course, but he wasn’t … eating himself from the inside”.
Investigations by the filmmakers show Scagio was moved out of the Duvdevan to a commander position in a different unit, distancing him from any investigation, as a result, the filmmakers guess, of having killed Abu Akleh.
Scagio was later killed in June 2024 by a roadside bomb in Jenin, the same West Bank city in which he is accused of killing Abu Akleh.
As a result of the fallout from Abu Akleh’s killing, Scagio’s friend claims the Duvdevan unit took to using her image for target practice.
The killing of Abu Akleh came during what at the time was considered an intense phase of Israeli raids on the occupied West Bank. She was one of at least 145 Palestinians killed during the raids in 2022.
But since then, Israel has only ramped up its violence in both the West Bank and Gaza.
Israel has killed more than 52, 000 Palestinians since it launched its war on Gaza in October 2023, decimating the territory and refusing the entry of food since March, starving the local population.
And in the West Bank, Israel has increased the severity of its attacks, using heavy weaponry and air strikes, and forcing Palestinians out of their homes. More than 900 Palestinians have been killed there.
Despite that, the US – both under former President Joe Biden and current President Donald Trump – has maintained its support of Israel, even as much of the rest of the world has criticised its actions.
At the United Nations, the US regularly votes alongside Israel, while the majority of member states seek to use the international body to pressure Israel to stop. And the US has threatened the International Criminal Court for seeking to arrest Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu for committing war crimes.