The Vatican confirmed that Pope Francis’ “pope-mobile” – a vehicle outfitted to protect the pontiff during his 2014 trip to the birthplace of Jesus Christ – is being converted into a mobile children’s clinic in Gaza according to the Holy Father’s dying wish.
The Catholic non-profit organization Caritas Jerusalem made the announcement on Sunday.
In a press release, the non-profit said that Francis directed the humanitarian organization in his final months to “turn his pope-mobile into a mobile health station for the children in Gaza.”
“The purpose of the initiative is to safeguard and uphold children’s fundamental rights and dignity,” Caritas Jerusalem wrote, releasing the first photos of the converted pope-mobile.
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Pope Francis waves to the crowd from inside his pope-mobile as he arrives at Manger Square to celebrate an open-air mass on May 25, 2014, in the West Bank Biblical town of Bethlehem. (Vincenzo Pinto/AFP via Getty Images)
Peter Brune, Secretary General of Caritas Sweden, which is supporting the initiative, said the vehicle “will be able to reach children who today have no access to healthcare – children who are injured and malnourished.”
“This is concrete, life-saving intervention at a time when the health system in Gaza has almost completely collapsed,” Brune said in a statement. “It’s not just a vehicle, it’s a message that the world has not forgotten about the children in Gaza.”
“The vehicle represents the love, care and closeness shown by His Holiness for the most vulnerable, which he expressed throughout the crisis,” Secretary General of Caritas Jerusalem Anton Asfar said in a statement.
Swedish Cardinal Anders Arborelius – a contender to become the next pope after Francis’ passing on April 21 – also confirmed the repurposing of the pope-mobile to the New York Times.
“The papamobile is a very concrete sign that Pope Francis is concerned with all the suffering of children in Gaza, even after his death!” Arborelius wrote to the Times.
The same Catholic charity network handling the “pope-mobile” project notably slammed the Trump administration’s cuts to the United States Agency for International Development (USAID) in February.
“Stopping USAID abruptly will kill millions of people and condemn hundreds of millions more to lives of dehumanizing poverty,” Caritas Internationalis Secretary General Alistair Dutton said at the time. “This is an inhumane affront to people’s God-given human dignity, that will cause immense suffering. Killing USAID also presents massive challenges for all of us in the global humanitarian community, who will have to completely reassess whom we can continue to serve and how.”
The State Department has integrated the remaining functions of USAID, as the department undergoes a massive restructuring.
Pope Francis waves to the crowd, from his pope-mobile, on May 25, 2014, outside the Church of the Nativity in the West Bank Biblical town of Bethlehem. (Abbas Momani/AFP via Getty Images)
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Francis approved the “pope-mobile” project in November 2024, the Times reported. The Catholic Church was gifted a new, all-electric “pope-mobile,” based on the Mercedes-Benz G-Class, an SUV, in December, according to USA Today.
Vatican News, the official news source of the Vatican, also picked up the announcement. The vehicle will be staffed “by a driver and medical doctors” and is currently being fitted with equipment for diagnosis, examination and treatment, including rapid tests for infections, suture kits, syringes and needles, oxygen supply, vaccines and a refrigerator for medicines, according to the non-profit.
“The humanitarian situation in Gaza is increasingly critical, especially for the nearly one million displaced children,” Caritas Jerusalem wrote. “When access to food, water and healthcare is cut off, children are often the first and hardest hit. Starvation, infection and other preventable conditions put their lives at risk.”
Before his passing, Francis “made his pope-mobile available to Caritas Jerusalem, which is now turning it into a mobile health unit for children,” according to the nonprofit. “When the humanitarian corridor to Gaza reopens, it will be ready to give primary healthcare to children in Gaza.”
Francis had repeatedly called for a cease-fire in Gaza during the Israel-Hamas war, which began on Oct. 7, 2023, when Hamas terrorists killed more than 1,200 people in Israel and took hundreds more into Gaza as hostages.
Pope Francis waves to the crowd from inside his pope-mobile on his way to Manger Square to celebrate an open-air mass on May 25, 2014, in the West Bank. (Jaafar Ashtiyeh/AFP via Getty Images)
The late pontiff has increasingly condemned the Israeli military’s response and the deaths of Palestinian children.
In his final Easter address before his passing, Francis said the humanitarian situation was “dramatic and deplorable.”
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“I express my closeness to the sufferings … of all the Israeli people and the Palestinian people,” he said in a message read aloud by an aide, according to Reuters. “I appeal to the warring parties: call a ceasefire, release the hostages and come to the aid of a starving people that aspires to a future of peace.”
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