DESPITE UGLY AND DEMEANING 8 METER HIGH WALL, MANY FROM AROUND THE GLOBE MAKE IT TO BETHLEHEM THIS CHRISTMAS

By William B. Walker

I celebrated Jesus' birthday by going to Bethlehem's Manger Square and singing Christmas carols with visitors from Italy, the USA, Canada, and Palestine-We did this just after the finishing of the midnight mass in the Nativity Church, where Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas had also been in attendance for the first time.

According to Al-Jazeera News, "A recent lull in violence and renewed Middle East peace talks have bolstered tourist and pilgrim numbers, with the Palestinian town in the West Bank enjoying its busiest Christmas since the second intifada began seven years ago .

Despite the festive atmosphere, however, a heavy police deployment, the presence of Israel's massive separation wall and unease among Bethlehem's ever-shrinking Christian population served as reminders of the lingering tensions in the region."

Al-Jazeera also noted that this recent seven-year period contrasts starkly with the 7 years just after the Oslo Peace Accords, which were signed in 1993. At that time many 1000s came each Christmas tide to Bethlehem for the first time.

This fairly disturbing trend in the lack of peace and security in Bethlehem and in other Israeli controlled Holy Land cities over these past 7 years has also coincided in a fairly great decline in the number of Jewish settlers arriving in Israel.

In short, on the face of it, the combined effects of the failed intifada of 2000 and the increase in the number of Israeli settlements (plus the somewhat obscene wall-building by Israel) over the last decade have made a mess out of what was once a blossoming peace process here in the Middle East.

NOTE: A pastor I know in Jerusalem has pointed out, too, that Israeli policies of the last two decades have also continued to sink the percentage of Christians living in either the West Bank or in Israel proper. That is, Christians in Israel are being forced by circumstances to migrate to safer climates or places where work and rights can be had more readily.

COMPARING TWO HOLY LANDS: ISRAEL vs. JORDAN

The disgraceful increase in violence in Israel over the past decade poses a sad contrast to its much poorer Holy Land neighbour, Jordan-another country which has also been active in the peace process since the 1990s.

THE JORDAN TIMES editorial, entitled "A Thought for Humanity", in the 25th of December edition of the THE JORDAN TIMES indicates the degree of impatience Jordan and other neighbouring Holy Land states are having with both Israel's and Hamas' belligerent (i.e. round-the-wagons) approach to governance and failed peacemaking in this new Millennium.

The JT editorialist writes, "Here in Jordan, Christians live side by side with Muslims in complete harmony, proving that the two faiths are not, and need not, be in conflict with each other. There is no clash of civilisations, indeed of religions, in the Kingdom. Muslim and Christian Jordanians have always coexisted in peace, harmony and love, a model of tolerance and goodwill."

The author continues, "True Islam, those who know it, like Christianity, preaches peace, love and compassion for fellow human beings, irrespective of their faith."

Next, this same editor laments, "Despite the message of love and peace spread by the monotheistic religions, it is sad to see that the birthplace of Jesus Christ is the farthest away from peace. The Holy Land, even Bethlehem where Jesus was born, is denied peace, living under occupation and enslavement. As long as the Palestinians, Muslim and Christian alike, are denied freedom, there can be no peace in the Middle East or elsewhere in the world."

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