ROME, Italy - Pope Francis made his first visit on Sunday to a synagogue as pontiff, citing an "unbreakable" bond between Jews and Christians as hundreds of armed security personnel were deployed for the Rome visit.

Pope hails ties with Jews on landmark synagogue visit https://t.co/COFJxyHIjD pic.twitter.com/RUldat03Iq

— AFP news agency (@AFP) January 17, 2016

Francis is the third pope to visit the Great Synagogue in Italy's capital after John-Paul II in 1986 and Benedict XVI in 2010.

Located just across the River Tiber from the Vatican, it stands in an area still known as the Ghetto where under the orders of some of Francis's predecessors, Jews were confined for more than three centuries until their emancipation at the end of the 19th Century.

Evoking "the unbreakable bond between Jews and Christians," the pope delivered a message of peace.

"Violence against men is in contradiction with any religion worthy of the name, and in particular the big monotheist religions," he said.

The pope was greeted with applause as he arrived and was met on the synagogue steps by Rome's chief rabbi Riccardo Di Segni.

Francis in turn greeted some 1,500 invited guests who filled the religious site to witness the pontiff's visit.

After the deadly attacks in Paris in November, claimed by the Islamic State group, security for the pope's visit is particularly tight, with basements in the area around the synagogue searched, dustbins sealed and parking banned.

Fears of a Paris-style assault in Rome have seen visitor numbers fall, while soldiers with automatic rifles have become a common sight around the city's historic center.

Ties between the Christianity and Judaism, which improved under both John-Paul II and Benedict XVI, have become warmer still under Francis, who has a long-standing friendship with Argentinean rabbi Abraham Skorka, with whom he jointly published a book of conversations about issues of ethics, morality and faith.

As part of his visit, the pope will view two commemorative plaques in the synagogue's gardens, one marking an incident in 1943 when more than 1,000 Jews were rounded up and deported to the Nazi death camp of Auschwitz and the other a 1983 attack on the building that left 37 injured and one dead.  — Agence France-Presse