David Sharrock
This is where Christendom began, and where it is ending, for Bethlehem at least, and, perhaps, for the Holy Land also. In a gloomy cave beneath the basilica of the Church of the Nativity is the spot where the Virgin Mary is supposed to have given birth to Jesus. If it wasn’t for the TV camera crews that crowd the grotto at this time of year to film the pious, and the exhibitionists, weeping their tears of joy or singing cheesy Christmas songs (Jingle Bells is a favourite with United States networks), then you could almost imagine that the atmosphere was spiritual, the place divine.
But stumble back up the stone steps, out through the door the Mamluks built to keep horse-borne marauders at bay, and Bethlehem is another world, nothing like the one that adorns a million Christmas cards.
So there is a green neon sign on the town hall on the far side of Manger Square, currently being refitted and pedestrianised: “Merry Christmas” it says. And elsewhere, amid the unpaved streets, gaping sewage pipes, rubble and the lights of arc-welding lamps busily re-creating a new, better Bethlehem in time for the millennium celebrations, there are a few feeble stabs at a Western Christmas: a Three Wise Kings banner, some tinsel in sad shop windows, a stall selling inflatable 1m-high Santa Clauses.
In Milk Grotto Street, Asad Abdallah Giacaman is selling carvings of camels, Christs and cribs, not to mention a large, glow-in-the-dark Our Lady of the Sorrows. Asad’s been in the business for 20 years, but he’s not as lucky as his cousin Salem, who owns the Il Bambino arts-and-sculpture store right on Manger Square, which attracts more tourists.
Asad is miserable, and it’s easy to see why – his shop is empty. “There are many tourists coming to Bethlehem. You can see them every day, arriving in buses. Israeli buses. They stop here for 40 minutes! And the guides tell them which stores to go to and take a commission from those store-owners. Up to 40%. The guides are Israelis. So in this street we don’t work.”
Is life better now under Palestinian self-rule? He hesitates. “It’s the same thing, it all depends on business. Peace is not coming. That’s why the Christians are leaving.
“You know I have to get permission to go into Jerusalem now? All Palestinians do, Christians and Muslims. They [the Israelis] can close the border any time they like, if anything happens. This is not freedom.”
I walk back down Milk Grotto Street to Manger Square and across the massive building site. Inside the municipality building, a few metres to the right of the Omar Bin Alkhatab mosque, the walls are lined with the portraits of past mayors, moustachioed and fez-wearing until the 1940s. Every one of them is Christian and male.
Hanna Nasser, the present mayor, is the scion of an old and wealthy Palestinian Christian family, natty in dark suit and silk tie. Nasser is frank about the future. First, the good news. “We don’t have many days left to prepare for it, but the end of the second millennium is important to us. Firstly, for the religious dimension, when all the believers around the world will celebrate the birth of Jesus, and this is the place where a turning point in history happened.
“Then there is the political dimension. The last state of the 20th century, Palestine, will be declared next year, which is our absolute right and a reason to celebrate. And then there is the tourist dimension. We must get some benefit from this. Some people still think Bethlehem is in Israel! But I won’t deceive myself, the Israelis are the winners in these celebrations. They have the infrastructure, the hotels, the tourist agencies. They will make a lot of money, but I am determined that we will get some benefit, too.”
He takes heart from the opening of the Palestinian airport at Gaza, but concedes that 1997 was the worst year on record for tourism to Bethlehem – only 700 000 visitors. This year might be even worse and, unless the peace process gets on a faster track, there will be no bonanza next year.
Until 1948, Bethlehem was 95% Christian. “But after the creation of the state of Israel, many of the Palestinian refugees driven out came to live here, with inevitable consequences. We started losing our demography.” Today, Palestinain Christians make up 35% of the 35 000 population of Bethlehem, a decline that mirrors the general picture: from 23% of the total population of British Mandate Palestine to today’s 2% over the same area.
There are larger populations of Bethlehemite Palestinians in Chile and Australia than in their town of origin. Nasser’s brother lives in El Salvador. “He left in 1950, when the family lost all its property in West Jerusalem. Every time I go to East Jerusalem [still overwhelmingly Palestinian], and that’s only when the Israelis give me a permit, I have to drive past our houses on the Hebron Road. I still have the deeds. You know the American Indians are finally getting their lands back? One day, perhaps, my children’s children will enjoy those houses again.”
Passage to Jerusalem – the “eternal and united capital” to Israelis, the “holy capital of Palestine” to Yasser Arafat – is becoming more and more difficult for Palestinians, making life all the harder in Bethlehem. “We have more than 30% unemployment. If this continues, I don’t think the Christians will survive. When you are the minority, you feel it.”
He is right. For the past 10 minutes, Nasser has been fighting to be heard above the sermon from the mosque. He tuts. “They shouldn’t have it so loud, they’ve been told to keep the volume lower, but, really, Bethlehem is a model of co-existence between the religions. We are solving our problems quietly.”
A sign outside the Church of the Nativity reads: “Special instructions for visitors. Enter to church in descent [sic] attire. No weapons of any kind are allowed inside. TV shooting will not be allowed without permission.” The roof leaks when it rains, but soon it will be fixed.
Down the hill are the offices of Bethlehem 2000, the co-ordinators of all the activity now reshaping Bethlehem in time for the millennium celebrations. Dr Nabil Kassis is its director and a minister in Arafat’s Cabinet. He leads me out on to the balcony of his office to admire the panorama. Below us is the village of Bet Sahur, where the shepherds washed their socks, according to the carol, and the three competing Shepherds Fields, one for each of the major Christian denominations.
Kassis is a Christian, from nearby Ramallah. He is happy to dismiss the Bethlehem myth as it is enjoyed in the West. “You have to look for love in the hearts of people rather than in the scenery around you. This romantic image of a Biblical village with shepherds is, well … the world has changed in the last 2 000 years.
“The Palestinian people, on the whole, have demonstrated their clear willingness to live in peace, despite our feeling of injustice. So, as far as peace is concerned, yes. But love? I don’t know. Even if you accept the situation, you don’t have to love it.”
With all the building and renovation, it is hard to escape the feeling that Bethlehem is becoming a theme park, peopled by a resentful Muslim majority and a fearful Christian rump. According to one statistician, the true number of Christians may be as low as 6 250. Which is perhaps why the crucifixes are going up on rooftops. By day, they look innocuous enough, but at night they become white neon beacons of conflict.
“They will create a mess, because there have never been crosses like these in the city before. I have been in touch with some of the people putting them up, and I told them, `This is not a way to show you are a Christian.’ It won’t help. You cannot stop demography. We don’t have any hatred, not even for the Israelis, really. We hate their government, but not their citizens.”
Nasser concludes as he began, sending out confused messages about an uncertain future tinged with pessimism. He leans forward and confides in a low voice: “You know what really interrupted the continued survival of the Christians here? The creation of Israel. They are thieves.”