FIVE THINGS ABOUT WHAT THE POPE SAID

1 WHAT HE SAID

Meeting with some migrants at the Basilica of St. Bartholomew in Rome on Saturday, Pope Francis relayed a story about a Middle Eastern refugee whose wife was killed by Islamist militants for holding on to her crucifix, according to the BBC.“I don’t know if he managed to leave that concentration camp (refugee centre),” the pope said. “Because many of them are concentration ... because there is a great number of people left there inside them.”

2 WHAT THE AJC SAID

The American Jewish Committee (AJC), which advocates for Jewish causes, released a statement saying it understood the pontiff’s sentiments but didn’t agree with his comparison. “The conditions in which migrants are currently living in some European countries may well be difficult, and deserve still greater international attention, but concentration camps they certainly are not,”AJC chief executive David Harris said in the statement on the group’s website.

3 WHAT THE AJC ASKED

“We respectfully urge the Pope to reconsider his regrettable choice of words,” Harris added. “Precision of language and facts is absolutely essential when making any historical reference, all the more so when coming from such a prominent and admired world figure.”

4 WHAT ONE CAMP WAS LIKE

The Calais camp for migrants in northern France, nicknamed “the Jungle,” had “cramped makeshift tents plagued by rats, water sources contaminated by (feces) and inhabitants suffering from tuberculosis, scabies and post-traumatic,” the Guardian newspaper reported.

5 WHAT GREEK POLITICIAN SAID

In Greece, Interior Minister Panagiotis Kouroublis, touring the Idomeni camp on the border with Macedonia, also compared it to a concentration camp. Idomeni was where a photo emerged of two Syrian parents washing their newborn baby in a puddle.“I do not hesitate to say that this is a modern-day Dachau, a result of the logic of closed borders,” he said. “Whoever comes here takes several blows to the stomach.”