Christians in the crossfire
By MARGOT PATTERSON
There were young people inside, policemen, civilians of different
stripes, a few dozen gunmen, and an assortment of about 40 monks, nuns and
priests of the Roman Catholic church, the Greek Orthodox church, and the
Armenian church. For days the stench from 250 unwashed bodies, from the open
wounds of those hurt by gunfire and from two rotting corpses filled the
cavernous church where most of the refugees spent their time waiting to be
delivered from a fate that grew grimmer hour by hour.
The Israeli siege of those inside the Church of the Nativity in
Bethlehem, built on what is considered the birthplace of Jesus, seemed a tale
straight from the 12th century. With electricity, telephone service and water
cut off and the only access to the outside world occasional phone calls made
from cellular telephones, those inside the compound of the Nativity subsisted
on dwindling supplies of food and water. When nine youths left the church on
April 26 carrying the coffins of two Palestinians killed earlier in the siege,
they reported that those who remained inside were surviving on a broth of
boiled water and grass.
For observers, the standoff between Palestinians and Israeli
soldiers at one of Christianitys most holy sites heightened the life and
death drama. That the birthplace of the Prince of Peace should become hostage
to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict seemed an obvious irony. But the siege that
kept Bethlehem citizens confined to their houses for weeks while those inside
the church lived in increasingly desperate circumstances also seemed an apt
metaphor for the predicament of Christians in the Holy Land, who form a small
minority under increasing strain. With Christian towns on the front lines of
military action and the Palestinian national movement taking on a new Islamic
undertone, observers inside and outside the Holy Land say not just the Church
of the Nativity but the Christian population itself is increasingly hostage to
outside forces.
The pressure being created by the occupation has unleashed
an unbearable set of pressures on the Christian community, and the Christian
churches here in America have turned a blind eye, said James Zogby,
president of the Arab-American Institute in Washington.
As many as 16 million Arab Christians exist in the Middle East,
but only a small and dwindling number remain in the Holy Land. Twenty percent
of the Palestinian population in 1948, Christians now comprise less than 2
percent of the Palestinian population. Partly because of the interest in the
Holy Land taken by Christian churches in Europe, the United States, Canada and
elsewhere, Palestinian Christians have more contacts in the West and greater
opportunities for travel and emigration than their Muslim countrymen, said Sr.
Elaine Kelley, an administrative director of Sabeel, an ecumenical Palestinian
peace and justice center in Jerusalem, who also works for the Portland, Ore.,
archdiocese. Those Christians who remain in Israel and the occupied territories
are an educated and relatively affluent segment of the Palestinian population
who emphasize that there is little apart from religious belief that
distinguishes them from other Palestinians.
The Arab Palestinian Christians are part and parcel of the
Arab Palestinian nation. We have the same history, the same culture, the same
habits and the same hopes, said the Rev. Riah Abu El-Assal, the Anglican
bishop of Jerusalem.
We are all under occupation. We endure the same suffering
and we have the same aspirations. We dont have any discrimination between
Christians and Muslims, said Fr. Raed Abu-Sahlia, chancellor of the
Catholic Church in Jerusalem and secretary to the Latin patriarch.
A new militancy
But growing Islamic militancy inside the Palestinian movement is
beginning to affect relations between Christian and Muslim Palestinians, said
Zogby and others NCR spoke to for this article. Unlike the first
intifada in which Christians and Muslims both participated, the second intifada
that began in the fall of 2000 has been primarily a Muslim movement with
Christians so far taking little part, said Jesuit Fr. Drew Christiansen. That
may change as the situation in the occupied territories worsens, notes
Christiansen, who said he understands that some of the armed men inside the
Church of the Nativity are Christian. An adviser on the Middle East to the
United States Conference of Catholic Bishops, Christiansen has been involved in
efforts to end the siege at the Church undertaken by Israelis to capture the
armed Palestinians inside.
The Palestinian movement is basically a secular nationalist
movement, Christiansen said. Because this intifada has been violent
from the beginning and because its groups like Hezbollah and Hamas and
Islamic Jihad, which have been leaders in this violence, theres been an
Islamicization of this intifada, said Christiansen. Its in
the interest of the United States and Israel to keep Palestine a secular state,
but if this is drawn out, the Islamicization of resistance is bound to
increase. The secular elements in the movement are going to be marginalized or
are going to take harder-line positions because of the
Islamicization.
In addition to the pressures of the occupation that all
Palestinians feel, Zogby said Christian Palestinians are now feeling a
challenge to their patriotism. Theyre seeing this Islamic fervor
develop around them, and theyre caught in a vise, said Zogby.
About 120,000 Christians live in Israel and another 50,000 in the
occupied territories. The Christian population includes Orthodox congregations,
Episcopalians, Lutherans and other Protestant denominations, and Roman
Catholics.
About two-thirds of the Christians living in the occupied
territories reside in a triangle formed by Bethlehem and the towns of Beit Jala
and Beit Sahour. Its an area that has become the focus of Israeli
military attention during the past year. Frequent firing by Palestinian
militiamen from these towns has drawn massive Israeli retaliation, with the
result that residents are leaving the area in great numbers. Christiansen said
that following the start of the second intifada in the fall of 2000, about 400
Christians left Beit Sahour by January 2001, and by July 2001 that number had
risen to about 2,400. In one Catholic parish, a thousand out of 2,000 people
had left by July 2001. Though emigration from Bethlehem has been going on for a
long time due in part to its greater prosperity, Christiansen said emigration
from Beit Sahour and Beit Jala is a new phenomenon related to the difficulties
presented by the second intifada.
The situation is very difficult on all fronts. For
Palestinian Christians, they experience the same hardships as all Palestinians
experience, and obviously many people are not prepared to stand this any longer
and are seeking a more peaceful life and a life of greater opportunity for
their family, said Franciscan Fr. David Jaeger, spokesman for the
Franciscan Custody of the Holy Land, which oversees Christian religious sites
in the Holy Land, including the Church of the Nativity.
Provoking retaliation
Why Bethlehem, Beit Sahour and Beit Jala have become centers of
Palestinian resistance is unclear. According to Br. David Scarpa, a Christian
Brother who is director of teaching at Bethlehem University, the militiamen
shooting from Bethlehem seldom do much damage to Israeli soldiers or settlers
living nearby but do provoke Israeli retaliation. The university has been a
frequent target of Israeli shelling, though Scarpa said the university campus
is not used by gunmen as a locale to shoot from.
Scarpa said in Beit Jala residents have done their best to prevent
gunmen from coming into their town because they are far more dangerous to the
people of Beit Jala than to Israeli soldiers.
Its very complicated, Scarpa said of the
background and motives of gunmen who use the Christian towns as a base to fire
at Israeli soldiers and settlers. He gave as an example one gunman apprehended
in 2000 by the Palestinian Authority who turned out to be a Jordanian in the
pay of the Israeli government.
Christiansen speculates that the presence of gunmen in Christian
areas may be an effort to draw Christians into the battle or it may be a
feeling that the outside Christian world would pay more attention if Christians
rather than Muslims were attacked. Christiansen said a certain envy of the
bourgeois status of Christians living in primarily middle-class towns may also
be a factor.
A lot of the militia people in the beginning came out of the
refugee camps and hill tribes, Christiansen said. Theres some
sense that because the Christians havent been for violence, they
havent been doing their share. In the first intifada, Christians were
just as involved as Muslims.
That has not been true of the second intifada, however.
Theres not the mysticism of violence among the Christians that you
have with others, Christiansen said.
Indeed, Christian Palestinians have historically been in the
vanguard of nonviolent resistance, Kelley said. For centuries Arab Christians
have served as a bridge between the Muslim community and the West, she
said.
Christiansen dismissed a report listed on at least one pro-Israeli
Web site that the Palestinian Authority has been behind the Islamicization of
resistance as disinformation. Saudi Arabia and other nations have
given money to poor Palestinians to buy property and to form Islamic schools,
but the Palestinian Authority has not been encouraging Christian emigration or
Islamicization in Bethlehem, he said.
Some informed observers suggest that its not impossible that
Israel may be behind the attacks of gunmen in Christian areas. Zogby points to
the role that Israel played in Nazareth where he said the Israelis fomented
plans by Islamic militants to construct a mosque beside the Basilica of the
Annunciation where the angel Gabriel is said to have appeared to Mary.
Theyre the ones that created the conflict between
Muslims and Christians in Nazareth over the building of the mosque, Zogby
said. They encouraged this Islamic fervor to begin with. Its the
same thing in Bethlehem. They create the condition for this fight to occur, for
this fear to occur, and then profess innocence as they reap the benefits of
this tension.
Scarpa said many people in Beit Jala are convinced that the
militiamens presence there is a setup. When you see people in
protected positions shooting their guns up into the air and triggering a
massive Israeli response and that seems to be their main intention.
Can
you give me an explanation for this?
Upsurge in emigration
Whatever the source of the gunfire that has made Bethlehem, Beit
Jala and Beit Sahour fought-over territory, the fighting has triggered a sharp
upsurge in Christian emigration as a result of Israeli troops choosing to
return rifle fire with tank fire and helicopter gun ships and destroying much
of the housing stock in those towns. Church leaders say that if the high rate
of emigration continues, Christianity could become extinct in the part of the
world that gave birth to it.
The concern of the church is that the Holy Land will become
a Christian museum rather than a place for a worshiping Christian community and
a continuing Christian community since the time of Christ, said
Kelley.
A resident of Bethlehem for four years, most recently from 1998 to
2000, Kelley said the Catholic church is taking an active role in trying to
keep a Christian community alive in Palestine. Kelley said Bethlehem
University, for example, was established after Pope Paul VI visited the Holy
Land and met with native Palestinian Christians who appealed to him because
there was no opportunity for higher education. The university now offers the
only bachelors degree in religious studies in Arabic in the country, and
the Latin patriarch is dependent on Bethlehem University for educating teachers
for Catholic schools throughout Israel and the occupied territories as well as
in Cyprus, Jordan and parts of Egypt.
In an attempt to minimize friction between the Christian and
Muslim communities and because they have considered Israeli attacks on churches
preferable to attacks on Palestinian homes, local church leaders have not been
publicizing Israeli attacks on church property, said Christiansen.
They wanted to prevent attacks on homes, and it was more
important to protect civilians than church property, Christiansen said.
They didnt want to create an immunity for themselves when Muslims
are under attack and they wanted to show themselves open to the same suffering
as their fellow Palestinians. Everybody is revolted at the notion of shelling
churches, but the point is that the people are the dwelling places of
God.
The Latin seminary in Beit Jala was shelled for three hours simply
on the grounds that suspicious people were seen nearby, Christiansen said,
adding that there have been many more violations of the rules of war on the
part of Israel than has been reported in the United States. Though the siege at
the Church of the Nativity has been widely covered in the press, Christiansen
said there have been surprisingly few protests from Christians in this country
as one week has slipped into the next. One Congressional aide on Capital Hill
told him there have been few calls about the matter.
Tea with the apostles
Historically, theres been a huge void of Christian
concern for the Christian Palestinian community and a major gap in knowledge
about their existence, Kelley said. Many, many times Ive
mentioned Christian Palestinians in this country, and people ask, Are
they converts? It amazes me because these people are not converts. They
are an indigenous, continuing Christian community. They joke that their
ancestors drank tea with the Apostles.
The religious right has become a major supporter of Israel.
Ironically, Zogby said, the religious right in the United States has not only
ignored the plight of Christian Palestinians but has been hostile to them.
They have an ideology that puts value on the Jews of the Holy Land
converting and not on the indigenous Christian communities that have been there
since the time of Christ, he said.
Kelley said Christians on the ground in Israel and the occupied
territories are appalled by the lack of concern on the part of churches in the
United States.
Typically, Christians are horribly ignorant of the situation
there. Even though our church officially supports Palestinians political
rights, the people in the pews -- about 70 percent of them -- support Israel.
That comes from the tradition of the Holocaust. But it has not come from real
knowledge of what has changed and what is happening there. The Jewish people
are no longer the victims. They are now the oppressors of the Palestinian
people, said Kelley.
While Catholic bishops have supported Palestinian rights and the
formation of a Palestinian state, Kelley said even many Catholic clergymen are
uninformed about the conflict in the Middle East and the situation of Christian
Palestinians. Efforts to lobby Congress on their behalf have met with little
success.
Congress is not responsive to our advocacy, said
Corinne Whitlach, director of Churches for Middle East Peace, an office that
lobbies for a more evenhanded U.S. policy in the Middle East and was created to
reflect the concerns of a coalition of mainstream churches that includes the
Episcopal church, the Presbyterian church, the United Methodist church, the
Church of the Brethren and Roman Catholic religious orders. Congress is
extremely pro-Israeli.
Whitlach said her office had not attempted to contact members of
Congress about the siege of the Church of the Nativity but was concentrating on
recent efforts in Congress to end diplomatic recognition for the Palestinian
Authority and to return the United States to the era when U.S. diplomats were
not allowed to speak to representatives of the Palestinian Liberation
Organization. Sponsored by Sen. Diane Feinstein (D-Calif.) and Mitch McConnell
(R-Ky.), the bill has rapidly won numerous cosponsors. Although Israel has
failed to comply with President Bushs request that it end its incursions
in the West Bank, the House of Representatives has proposed giving Israel
another $200 million in aid on top of a $3 billion aid package it annually
receives.
As American citizens, dont these people have some
responsibility to know what is happening in our Congress? Whitlach
asked.
In Jerusalem, Samia Khoury, a Palestinian Christian who works at
the Sabeel Center, said that modern Western people relate much more to fears on
behalf of Israel than concerns for a largely Muslim Palestinian population.
The Biblical context influences people, she said, adding that she
and other Palestinians have been challenged to reevaluate their faith in the
light of historical circumstances.
When all of this started in 1948, we asked why? Is this the
God of justice we know? Because that was the justification. God gave us
this land, and we are the chosen people. Our dispossession was done in
the name of God, in the name of the Bible, Khoury said.
A liberation theology center adapted to a Palestinian context,
Sabeel developed a program that took visitors on what Khoury calls a
modern Via Dolorosa, with trips to a refugee camp, demolished
Palestinian homes, and Israeli checkpoints in the occupied territories.
Theres been so much distortion of facts, so much
obliteration of facts, Khoury said. If an Israeli child is killed,
its all over the media. If a Palestinian child is killed, nobody
cares.
Church under siege
As of May 1, the siege of the Church of the Nativity continued
despite what Christiansen said were constant reassurances from the United
States government that the siege would end shortly.
On April 30, 26 Palestinians were allowed to leave the church,
leaving about 200 still in the church. Kept closely apprised of the status of
the negotiations, Jaeger said he didnt understand why talks were taking
so long.
We are impeded from any kind of access to our
community, he said. We are impeded from carrying food to them. The
condition must be getting direr all the time. We are asking this of the
parties: Why?
Pope John Paul II, who has taken a close interest in the crisis,
personally calling the Franciscans inside the compound of the Church of the
Nativity to express his support, sent a special envoy, Cardinal Roger
Etchegaray, to Jerusalem May 1 in a visit aimed at directly participating in
solving the crisis.
For their part, the Franciscans have issued a plea for greater
involvement of the Christians around the world in pressing for an end to the
siege.
At the beginning of the fifth week of occupation and
siege of the Sanctuary of the Nativity in Bethlehem, the Order of Friars
Minor expresses its bitter disbelief at the incapacity of the civilized world
to induce the parties to accept and carry out a greatly longed-for pacific
solution, the Franciscans said in a message posted on their web site
April 30.
Related Web sites Bethlehem
University www.bethlehem.edu
Franciscan Custody of the Holy
Land 198.62.75.1/www1/ofm/cust/TSmain.html
Sabell www.sabeel.org
Margot Patterson is NCR senior writer. She traveled to
Israel to report on the conflict in March. Her e-mail address is
mpatterson@natcath.org
National Catholic Reporter, May 10,
2002
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