Fear stalks the Christian community of Bethlehem. Threats, attacks, kidnappings, rape, and murder are daily occurrences here and few in Christian countries are willing to stand up for or even to listen to the complaints and pleas of their co-religionists. Politicians, reporters, and even religious authorities are afraid of crossing the Palestinian Authority or HAMAS. Who could blame them? The Palestinian Authority and HAMAS often work hand-in-glove.
For Muslim Palestinians, Bethlehem is a source of tourism revenue and a reminder that other religions are practiced among them. Triumphal Islam will not tolerate open practice of other religions. This is the reason for the vehement opposition to Israel and the persecution of Palestinian Christians that only fifty years ago constituted a majority of the population. Today's population that has fallen to 12%. Within twenty years all Christians may be gone from the traditional town of Christ's birthplace.
They are fleeing for a variety of reasons, mostly to escape violence and persecution.
Yet off the record, many Christians in Bethlehem who were interviewed during the past week expressed deep concern over increased attacks by Muslims on members of their community. Moreover, most of them said that they were seriously considering moving to the US, Canada and Latin America, where many of their relatives already live.They are confounded that co-religionists in the West do nothing.
Jihad, a Christian merchant from the nearby town of Beit Jala, who has been dealing in antique furniture for over 30 years, says he is planning to leave for good to Chile, where at least 80,000 of his townsfolk now live. "There are less than 10,000 Christians living in Beit Jala today," he explains. "There's no future here because of the deteriorating economic conditions." His friend, George, who used to own a souvenir shop, says he's planning to move next week to Peru, where his brothers and sisters have been living for the past 15 years. The two, who asked to be identified only by their first names, are extremely cautious when the issue of Muslim-Christian relations is raised. "It's true that there have been a number of cases of violence against Christians, but generally speaking the situation is not that bad," George stresses.
Other Christians in Beit Jala disagree. According to a local physician, the plight of the Christians has been aggravated over the past decade in general and since the outbreak of the intifada in particular. "After the Palestinian Authority arrived here in 1995, many Muslim families from Hebron and other parts of the West Bank have moved to Beit Jala," he says. "What's worrying is that some of them have illegally seized privately-owned lands. When one of the Christian owners refused to sell his land to a senior Palestinian security official, he was arrested for a number of days."
In another case, a 60-year-old Christian man was briefly detained by one of the Palestinian security forces because he had forbidden his daughter to date a Muslim security officer. Other Christians who tried to stop Fatah gunmen in Beit Jala from firing into the Jerusalem neighborhood of Gilo in the first years of the intifada later reported that they had been beaten or threatened by the gunmen.
The same gunmen are also responsible for the rape and murder of two Christian teenage sisters from the Amr family. The assailants then claimed that the sisters had been murdered because they were "prostitutes" and had been "collaborating" with Israeli security forces - a claim that has been strongly denied by the victims' relatives and many residents of the town. "The gangsters murdered the two sisters so that they would not tell anyone about the rape," says a family member. "Some of the murderers were later killed by the Israeli army, but others are now living in Europe after they had sought refuge in the Church of Nativity. It's absurd that Muslim men who rape and murder Christian girls are given political asylum in Christian countries like Ireland, Spain and Italy."
Last week Beit Jala was once again the scene of religious tensions after a Christian woman complained that she had been harassed by Muslim men from the village of Beit Awwa in the Hebron area. "Such incidents have become a daily phenomenon," says Mary, who runs a small grocery in the town. "Many Christian families have sent their daughters abroad for fear they would come under attack by Muslim men."
Earlier this year tensions between Muslims and Christians in Bethlehem reached a peak after a Christian family complained that their 16-year-old daughter had been kidnapped by a Muslim man. Following the intervention of senior Palestinian officials and Muslim leaders, the girl was reunited with her family after spending a few days in a village near Hebron. With the help of American diplomats, the girl was flown immediately to the US to begin a new life with relatives and friends.
Some Christians point a finger at the foreign media and diplomatic missions in Israel, accusing them of ignoring their predicament for "political" reasons. "Although most of the foreign journalists and diplomats are Christians, they don't seem to pay enough attention to what's happening to the Christians in Bethlehem," says Bishara, a Christian tourist guide. "They're obviously afraid of damaging their relations with the Palestinian Authority."Pity. Christians may be soon be gone from Bethlehem and as a reminder of why the Crusades were called.
While it's almost impossible to find a Christian who's prepared to go public in airing such grievances, Samir Qumsiyeh, a journalist from Beit Sahur, is a notable exception. Last month he was quoted by the Italian newspaper Corriere della Sera as saying that Christians were being subjected to rape, kidnapping, extortion and expropriation of land and property... "The racism against us is gaining pace in staggering ways. In 1950 the Christian population in Bethlehem was 75%. Today we have hardly more than 12% Christians. If the situation continues, we won't be here any more in 20 years."
The conquest of Jerusalem in 638 stood at the beginning of centuries of Muslim aggression, and Christians in the Holy Land faced an escalating spiral of persecution. A few examples: Early in the Eight century, sixty Christian pilgrims from Aarmorium were crucified; around the same time, the Muslim governor of Caesarea seized a group of pilgrims from Iconium and had them all executed as spies--except for a small number who converted to Islam; and Muslims demanded money from pilgrims, threatening to ransack the Church of the Resurrection if they didn't pay. Later in the eighth century, a Muslim ruler banned displays of the cross in Jerusalem. He also increased the anti-religious tax (jizya) that Christians had to pay and forbade Christians to engage in religious instruction of others, even of their own children. Brutal subordination and violence became the rules of the day for Christiansin the Holy Land. In 772, the caliph el-Mansur ordered the hands of Christians and Jews in Jerusalem to be stamped with a distinctive symbol. Conversions to Christianity were dealt with particularly harshly. In 789, Muslims beheaded a monk who had converted from Islam and plundered the Bethlehem monastery of Saint Theodosius, killing many more monks... In reaction to this persecution of Christians, the Byzantines removed from a defensive policy toward the Muslims to the offensive position of trying to recapture some of their lost territories. In the 960s, General Nicephorus Phocas (a future Byzantine emperor) carried out a series of successful campaigns against the Muslims, recapturing Crete, Cilicia, Cyprus, and even parts of Syria. In 969, he recaptured the ancient Christian city of Antioch. The Byzantines extended this campaign into Syria into the 970s...
People have forgotten that Christianity was once widespread in what today is the Muslim world and most don't know that Islam is an imperialistic religion of desert Arabs that use religion as a pretext for conquest. Most Muslims have forgotten that Islam and the Koran are based on Arab culture and written in Arabic for the obvious reason that Arabs are the first among Muslims. Mecca, the holy city, is in Saudi Arabia, the seminal seat of Arabism. Imperialist Islam is hot on the heels of a resurgent and benign Christianity that is spreading through parts of Africa, Asia, and South America. Conquest and the spoils of war are much on the minds of Muslim conquerers whether the conquest is done with the sword, the ballot box, or the economy. Non-Muslims in lands overcome by Islam will find themselves in the same predicament as do contemporary Christians in Bethlehem: convert, flee, or die.
Soon there will be no hiding place if non-Muslims don't take a stand as Jihadis are found in all countries of the world. If no stand is taken in contemporary courts and legislatures, someday banners of defensive Crusaders may flutter again over beseiged cities, using violence as they attempt to rid themselves of a scourge that so easily could have dealt with using the rule of law. The choice is ours. (1) Spencer, Robert. The Politically Incorrect Guide to Islam (And the Crusades), Regnery Publishing Company, 2005. pp. 121-123.
©Eleanor
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