Volkswacht Bodensee - Francis's popemobile converted into clinic for Gazan children

The iconic open-sided vehicle, designed to allow the pontiff to greet crowds of well-wishers, has been transferred to Caritas Jerusalem and will head to Gaza if and when Israel opens a humanitarian corridor.

The car, a converted Mitsubishi, was used by the pope during a 2014 visit to Bethlehem and had since been on display, gathering dust and rust. It has now been repaired and refurbished as a mobile clinic.

"With the vehicle, we will be able to reach children who today have no access to healthcare -- children who are injured and malnourished," said Peter Brune, secretary general of Caritas Sweden.

Brune told AFP that Sweden's Cardinal Anders Arborelius had asked the late pope, who died on April 21 aged 88, that the spare vehicle be put to use providing essential frontline healthcare to Palestinian children.

It will be fitted with medical equipment and a fridge for medicines and be assigned a driver and a team of doctors.

"This vehicle represents the love, care and closeness shown by His Holiness for the most vulnerable, which he expressed throughout the crisis," said Anton Asfar, secretary general of Caritas Jerusalem.

It was not clear, however, if or when the aid agency's hoped-for humanitarian corridor would open.

Israel resumed major operations across Gaza on March 18 amid political deadlock over how to build on a two-month ceasefire in its war against Hamas, which was sparked by the militants' October 2023 attack.

On Monday, Israel's security cabinet approved an expansion of military operations that would lead to what an official described as the "conquest" of the Palestinian territory.

The health ministry in Hamas-run Gaza said Sunday that at least 2,436 people had been killed since Israel resumed its campaign on March 18, bringing the overall death toll from the war to 52,535.

Hamas's attack on October 7, 2023 resulted in the deaths of 1,218 people on the Israeli side, mostly civilians, according to an AFP tally based on official figures.

S.Spengler--VB