In a traditional season of merriment, many Palestinian Christians – in Bethlehem and beyond – are gripped with helplessness, pain and worry amid Israel’s brutal war on Gaza.
Some are mourning, lobbying for the war to end, scrambling to get relatives to safety or seeking comfort in the Christmas message of hope.
In the occupied West Bank, Suzan Sahori, the Executive Director of Bethlehem Fair Trade Artisans, an organisation selling crafts, will pray for peace and justice. She’s grateful she’s safe – but wonders if that could change. She’s also angry.
She says the joy in her heart is stolen, and she questions God, how can he allow all these children to die?
In better times, she finds the Christmas spirit in the Bethlehem area unmatched.
Now, it’s all quieter, with the tree lighting ceremonies she attended last year have been scrapped.
The heads of churches in Jerusalem have urged congregations to forgo any unnecessarily festive activities.
They have encouraged priests and the faithful to focus on Christmas’s spiritual meaning and called for “fervent prayers for a just and lasting peace for their beloved Holy Land”.
More than 20,000 Palestinians have been killed in Israel’s ongoing offensive in Gaza, launched after Hamas’s October 7th attack that left nearly 1,200 people dead and Hamas taking more than 200 others captive.
There are 50,000 Christian Palestinians estimated to reside in the West Bank and Jerusalem, according to the US State Department’s International Religious Freedom Report for 2022.
Approximately 1,300 Christians lived in Gaza. Some Christians are also citizens of Israel. Many Palestinian Christians live in diaspora communities.
Source: Aljazeera
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