Bethlehem spends Christmas beneath the shadow of war
The birthplace of Jesus is a ghost town as fighting between Israel and Hamas continues to rage in Gaza
Christmas is officially cancelled in Bethlehem this year, with the birthplace of Jesus resembling a ghost town as fighting between Israel and Hamas rages.
Manger Square, usually thronging with tourists and ablaze with festive lights and decorations, was largely empty when The Daily Telegraph visited. At its centre is a nativity scene showing the baby Jesus wrapped in a white shroud, surrounded by rubble and barbed wire, in a chilling echo of the thousands of children killed in Gaza.
Nearby, a group of students unfurled a giant Palestinian flag in silence.
On Sunday, one of the city’s scouts bands that march across Bethlehem celebrating Christmas with drums and trumpets, walked the cobbled streets in silence, holding posters in Arabic and English, some of them saying “Gaza is in the heart” and “Let the war stop now”. Situated in the volatile West Bank, Bethlehem is no stranger to war and instability. But no one here can remember the last time both church leaders and local authorities agreed to cancel Christmas altogether.
Rev Dr Munther Isaac, the pastor of Bethlehem’s Evangelical Lutheran church, said this was the most challenging Christmas season he had experienced, conceding that he no longer felt able to preach a message of hope. “We’ve lost all hope for peace,” he said. “I can’t preach and promise my people empty words that things will get better,” he told The Telegraph, adding that he feared the devastation in Gaza, where more than 20,000 people have now died, according to the Hamas-run health ministry, could one day spread to the West Bank.
Rev Isaac and his congregation wanted to channel the pain and anger that the local Christians feel about the plight of Gaza. Their own nativity
‘We’ve lost all hope for peace, I can’t preach and promise my people empty words that things will get better’
scene features Jesus as a baby, wrapped in the Palestinian keffiyeh, lying in a manger formed from rubble.
The message, Rev Isaac said, is that “he’s with those children who are bombed and rescued, hopefully, alive from under the rubble”.
The story of the birth of Jesus in Bethlehem has a special resonance with Palestinians this year. “The Christmas story has become our story: A family that had to travel during the occupation because of a census by the emperor, that’s meant for registration and control… is very similar to the magnetic card system that we have here,” Rev Isaac said, referring to the biometric ID cards that Palestinians seeking to work in Israel must obtain.
Earlier this month, the pastor led a delegation of Bethlehem church leaders to Washington in what he now describes as a “naive” hope that, with Christmas approaching, American politicians would heed their call for peace. “We said: ‘All we’re asking for is a ceasefire’,” the pastor said.
The American officials and politicians, he said, were very blunt, telling him “this war must continue”.
Since the trip, however, the US and Israel’s allies have ramped up pressure on Israel to minimise civilian casualties in Gaza.
Thanks to a US abstention, the United Nations Security Council managed to pass a motion to get more aid into the besieged enclave last week, but the body fell short of backing a call for a ceasefire.
The Israel Defense Forces has conducted several raids in Bethlehem since the Oct 7 attacks, setting the city on edge, and the cancellation of Christmas festivities has struck a severe blow to the town’s economy.
With many major airlines cancelling flights to Israel, few foreigners are visiting. “This is the first time we see the church in December empty like this,” said Father Issa Thalijeh, a Greek Orthodox priest at the Church of the Nativity. This year, instead of managing crowds of tourists, much of his time had been taken up helping parishioners left without work amid the West Bank lockdown, he told The Telegraph.
Like many in Bethlehem, the plight of Gaza’s Christians weighed heavily on Father Issa.
Gazan Christians used to travel to Bethlehem for Christmas every year, having secured special permits from Israel that offered a rare chance to leave the Strip. Like other churches in the city, the Church of Nativity has scrapped all its Christmas celebrations.
One of the oldest Christian communities in the world, Bethlehem’s Greek Orthodox community now numbers about 3,500 people, Father Issa said, adding that it was twice as large when he was ordained 11 years earlier.
Mona, a Bethlehem resident who came to the church with a friend, told The Telegraph she supported the idea of cancelling Christmas festivities, saying locals were in no mood to celebrate.
“This is the birthplace of Jesus: it should be the light of the world. It gets me down what’s happening around us,” said Mona, who declined to give her second name.
But however difficult the circumstances, Father Issa tries to keep his faith. He refuses to give up hope, taking inspiration from the cave underneath the church where a silver 14-pointed star embedded in the polished marble slab marks the supposed place of Jesus’s birth.
“This light is shining on us. This light will come to us one day. If I don’t build my thoughts on peace and love, it will never come to us,” he said.