Bethlehem, sad and isolated. Christians emigrate NEWS BRIEFS 23 December, 2003, PALESTINE - CHRISTMAS, Bethlehem (AsiaNews)

Due to Israeli anti-terrorism measures, a huge number of Christians hailing from Nazareth, Jerusalem and from other parts of Palestine and Israel are prohibited from entering Bethlehem. “It is a sad Christmas being celebrated in the city where Jesus was born,” said Dr. Bernard Sabella, executive secretary to the Middle East Ecumenical Council of Churches in service of Palestinian refugees.

Sabella told AsiaNews of the dark cloud hovering over Manger Square and the Church of the Nativity. “Shopkeepers in the square are suffering greatly due to the grave economic situation. One of them said to me: ‘I open my shop at 9:00 in the morning and close the doors at noon, or 12:30 at the latest. There are no visitors, no pilgrims. Hotels are empty. No one comes to Galilee.’ ”

The system of road closures and checkpoints leave little opportunity for inhabitants of Bethlehem. They are drawing on savings and, once gone, citizens must seek help from charities. Dr. Sabella says that the problem has another sad repercussion. “Even the people of Bethlehem are not free to move about, visit holy sites in Jerusalem and visit their own friends and relatives.”

The only way of getting to Bethlehem is enter by side routes. But this is illegal and if caught, explained Sabella, “you risk paying heavy fines, going to jail and undergoing inhuman and humiliating treatment.”

Meanwhile children in Bethlehem continue acting like all other children in the world: they laugh and play, are carefree and full of life. Their parents, however, are worried. Many young Palestinian Christians choose to emigrate. Some merely want to abandon Bethlehem’s isolation, while others emigrate to other countries.

“Since the beginning of the second Intifada (Sept. 2000),” Sabella tells AsiaNews, “over 2500 Christian Palestinians have left Bethlehem, emigrating to Canada, USA, Australia and other foreign countries. If you ask them why, they answer ‘for my childrens’ future’.”

Christians in difficult circumstances around world struggle to celebrate Christmas Bethlehem, Dec. 24, 2003 (CWNews.com)

Bethlehem, Dec. 24, 2003 (CWNews.com) - As Christmas approaches, members of oppressed Christian communities around the world greet the holy day with faith and hope, if not open expressions of celebration. In China, Cuba, and the Holy Land, the political situation conspired to create a gloomy atmosphere for some, while others remained philosophical about the test of their faith in difficult circumstances.

In China, despite tolerance for commercial and secular celebrations of Christmas-- stores decorated with Santas and Christmas trees for present-buying shoppers-- members of Chinese underground churches express renewed fears in the midst of a Communist crackdown on their unauthorized activities. "Everyone is scared now. This Christmas will be tougher than usual," said the organizer of an underground church in the eastern city of Hangzhou whose building was destroyed in October. The man spoke on condition of anonymity. Dozens of Catholics and Protestants have been arrested this year for illegal religious activity and since this past summer, the government has engaged in a more vigorous campaign to destroy unauthorized church buildings.

In Cuba, 75 members of the dissident Christian Liberation Movement are spending Christmas in prison, after being jailed last March. "Cuban political prisoners are confined in punishment cells and are living in conditions even animals should not be subjected to," Oswaldo Paya, leader of the Christian Liberation Movement. The dissidents received prison terms of up to 28 years on charges of trying to overthrow the Communist government. The wives of the imprisoned dissidents, all but one of them men, have set up Christmas trees in their homes with ornaments and lights to remember their loved ones. "I have not heard anything for a month, and they won't even allow him to call me for the holidays," said Dolia Leal, the wife of dissident Nelson Aguiar.

In Bethlehem, the ongoing intifada has kept away the usual crowds of tens of thousands of pilgrims who crowd into Manger Square on Christmas Eve. Instead a few thousand people , almost all of them locals, gathered in the square to watch the traditional procession led by Latin-rite Patriarch Michel Sabbah of Jerusalem. Because of the three-year-old Palestinian revolt, Bethlehem, which once welcomed 1.3 million visitors every year, saw on 60,000 in 2003. "People here used to wait all year in anticipation of Christmas. Now Christmas is like any other day," taxi driver Naef al-Moadi said, summing up the gloomy mood.

Bethlehem faces another gloomy Christmas 18 Dec 2004 CathNews

Israel has barred Palestinian leader Yasser Arafat from Christmas celebrations in Bethlehem for a third straight year, as the West Bank town prepares for yet another depressing Christmas.

The place of Jesus' birth has been battered by relentless Palestinian-Israeli violence that has decimated its tourism-based economy, throwing thousands out of work, closing shops and leaving the town's residents with little to celebrate.

An Associated Press feature described the Church of the Nativity as empty, with "a few ornaments hung forlornly on trees" in a deserted Manger Square, just over a week before Christmas.

Arafat told a Christian delegation at his sandbagged headquarters in the West Bank city of Ramallah on Tuesday that he hoped to take part in the Christmas festivities this year in Bethlehem.

"I haven't missed it, except since being besieged in this building," Arafat said.

An Israeli official said the Palestinian Authority had requested that Arafat be allowed to make the 20 km trip from Ramallah to Bethlehem, but Israel would not agree.

Arafat, a Muslim, had attended Midnight Mass on Christmas Eve in Bethlehem each year after Israel turned Bethlehem over to his Palestinian Authority in 1994.

Christmas Eve then became as much a Palestinian political celebration as a religious one, with posters of Arafat and streamers made of hundreds of little Palestinian flags flying alongside strings of colored lights. Crowds of young Palestinians celebrated independence alongside Christian tourists and pilgrims.

Last Christmas, the Vatican complained to Israel about access to Manger Square in Bethlehem because it was again under Israeli military occupation. The Israelis had moved back into the town in response to violence, but pulled their tanks back just before Christmas.

This time they are a bit further away, after leaving the town again in July. But Nasser said they caused $A6.7 million in damage in their seven months in the town. Israeli soldiers are manning checkpoints at the entrances to Bethlehem, restricting movement there, as they do in the rest of the West Bank.

ASIA/HOLY LAND - IN NAZARETH JEWISH, CHRISTIAN AND MUSLIM STAFF WORK IN HARMONY AT HOLY FAMILY HOSPITAL RUN BY ST JOHN OF GOD HOSPITALLER BROTHERS ' 10-12-2003 Rome (Fides Service)

Rome (Fides Service) – Despite the hostility of former regimes, wars with related military occupation, damage due to earthquakes, the activity of the Catholic Holy Family Hospital in Nazareth run by the St John of God Hospitaller Brothers, is highly appreciated by the people of Nazareth and the surrounding villages who come for treatment whatever their religion. For over 120 years the 109 bed hospital has treated more than 50,000 patients every year, resident patients, emergency cases and surgery service. It gives work to many people and is one of the main economic resources in the area..

Although the situation in Israel is very difficult, terror and hatred take many lives and damage the economy, particularly resources assigned to healthcare, the hospital carries on with its work offering many health-services not found at other hospitals in the Arab part of Israel. General Director Giuseppe Fraizzoli says people feel at home at Holy Family which is more than a hospital. It is a concrete example that people of different race or religions can live and work together peacefully and in harmony. Day in day out without discrimination or hatred Israelis and Arabs, Jews and Muslims and Christians work together to care for the sick.

(AP) .(10/12/2003 Fides Service; lines:21 words:232)

Jerusalem prelate calls terrorism 'immoral and a sin' NEWS BRIEFS Dec-5-2003, By Catholic News Service

JERUSALEM (CNS) -- Terrorism is both "immoral and a sin," said Jerusalem's Latin-rite patriarch in a new document. Patriarch Michel Sabbah said the church condemns "all acts of violence ... especially terrorism" that are intended to "injure and kill the innocent." The document, "Reflections on the Presence of the Church in the Holy Land," released Dec. 3, was signed by the 10 other members of the patriarchate's Theological Commission. Patriarch Sabbah said in the document that the church was "painfully conscious" of the climate and "context of despair" in which acts of violence were committed. "We have stated: In the case of terrorism there are two guilty parties: first, those who carry out such action, those who plan and support them, and secondly, those who create situations of injustice which provoke terrorism," the document said.