Last Christmas in Bethlehem

With its Christmas displays cancelled, Bethlehem resident Christy Anastas writes about a bleak future for its Christian Palestinian community.

Christy Anastas

Christy Anastas is a Bethlehem resident. She is a Palestinian advocate for nonviolent ways of mediating a more stable Middle East.

A church gable featuring a cross, a Madonna and angel Christmas decorations.

2017 Christmas decorations on the Church of the Nativity, Bethlehem

Jana Humeedat, CC BY-SA 4.0, via Wikimedia Commons

Religious minority groups, like Christians, represent about one per cent of the overall Palestinian population. We feel stuck between a rock and a hard place in this conflict. As a consequence of this war, many of us are already planning to emigrate once the opportunity arises. If this happens, Bethlehem will virtually become a non-Christian city. This would be a sad outcome given it was the birthplace of Jesus Christ and that in the early 1900s the Christian population used to be just under 85 per cent. Now Bethlehem's population is approximately five per cent Christian. After this war we fear that these statistics would decrease even more. The main source of income of the city heavily relies on tourism, with almost 70 per cent of Bethlehem’s GDP due to religious pilgrims from all over the world visiting Jesus Christ’s birthplace, especially during Christmas.

This is the first year for decades, when all Christmas festive displays have been cancelled in Bethlehem. This decision taken by Bethlehem municipality and the Palestinian church is a sobering and poignant one and comes with a financial heavy price paid by locals. Such traditions have been kept for decades, even during the second Intifada, so that between 2000 to 2005 a Christmas tree in Manager Square was still displayed each year. Even the Covid-19 pandemic did not stop Bethlehem from decorating the entire city. However, today many Palestinian Christians are not in a festive mood. The Israel-Hamas war is in its second month and has already a higher death toll than during the whole of five years of the second Intifada.

A ceasefire is what Palestinian Christians will be praying for during this Christmas, alongside praying against the perpetual cycles of death, violence, and destruction.

In my opinion it feels fitting to stand in solidarity with those who mourn, inspired by Paul’s letter to the Romans encouraging Christians to “Rejoice with those who rejoice; mourn with those who mourn”. During such devastating circumstances of the civilians in Gaza, Palestinian Christians are heartbroken at the enormity of lives lost and the desperate conditions experienced especially by children. The desire to celebrate the birth of the most important child in Christianity’s history is dimmed by the death toll of children in Gaza during this war. An ancient biblical proverb offers a powerful depiction of what it would be like for us Christians to celebrate Christmas as usual. It would have felt “like one who takes away a garment on a cold day, or like vinegar poured on a wound, is one who sings songs to a heavy heart.”

However, the announcement of the cancellation issued by the head of Bethlehem municipality, was made exclusively in honour of Palestinian “martyrs”, in Gaza and the West Bank. This disappointing statement distorts the church’s role in the region as a peace builder and the bridge amongst different communities and ethnicities. In fact, it is an utterly missed opportunity for the church to demonstration its ethics and values in the region, especially when confronted with losses of lives across all ethnicities and religions. A more inclusive nuanced statement that could have honoured the suffering of all, could have been worded along the lines of offering tributes to the devastating losses of lives in the Israel-Hamas war since the 7th of October, without any discrimination or prejudice. That old proverb continues to say, “if your enemy is hungry, give him food to eat; if he is thirsty, give him water to drink.”

The exclusivity of the statement's approach made by the churches was a lost opportunity to express a more authentic side of Christianity to the world revealed from its birthplace. It could have counteracted the way the church was portrayed in Europe during the Holocaust. It could have been the chance to respond in a less indifferent manner to the plights of the Jewish people in the region, rather than reiterate a similar stance of the European churches during World War II.

A ceasefire is what Palestinian Christians will be praying for during this Christmas, alongside praying against the perpetual cycles of death, violence, and destruction, inspired by what our brothers and sisters in Gaza have conveyed to us in private communication. Christians in Gaza are pleading for peace and stating that as a community, they oppose violence. The zero-sum approach towards this war has made it difficult for us Christians to be true to our faith without being condemned or oppressed for it. When we call for a ceasefire, we are accused of supporting terrorism and denying Israel’s right to self-defence. However, when we want to acknowledge the suffering of the Israeli side during the 7th of October, we are deemed to be traitors. Our objective isn’t to attempt to prevent Israel from defending itself; rather, to suggest that the consequences of inflicting violence and bloodshed in retaliation could reinforce a stronger hold for violence and extremism in the region.

Therefore, most Palestinian Christians do not feel they have the freedom to stand for their beliefs and the churches in the region are not portraying the best paradigm. In my opinion, this is one of the main factors behind the drastic decline of the Christian population generally especially in Bethlehem. It is also why they no longer hold as much power as they used to in influencing the culture and mindsets in the area. Their roles became more politicised which has gradually led them to neglect standing up for truth until it has become too dangerous to even express it. This could well lead to a reality where this would be the last Christmas in Bethlehem for a majority of Christian families.

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Nationalism

4 December 2023

5 min read

Geert Wilders: heir apparent to an anxious nation

The election of a populist has shocked The Netherlands. Wim Houtman unpacks the result and explores anxious attitudes among electors, particularly Christians.

Wim Houtman

Wim Houtman is a senior editor with Nederlands Dagblad, a Christian daily newspaper in the Netherlands.

A politician in a suit stands amid a scrum of reporters holding microphones

Geert Wilders is at the centre of media attention in The Netherlands.

Much has been made in recent years of the similarity in appearance - their hair dos especially - between Donald Trump, Boris Johnson and Geert Wilders. All three sport this striking blond head of hair, invariably cut in the same style - be it with loosely non-conformist locks or carefully eccentric waves.

It’s their trademark, it sets them apart - instantly recognizable. And it sends a message: Here is a leader who stands out, who doesn’t care what is ‘normal’ or ‘accepted’ or what others may think; he knows what he wants, he knows what you want and he will go for it.

Until a fortnight ago, Dutch politician Geert Wilders was the leader of a relatively minor party on the far right, with a strong anti-Islam, anti-immigration agenda. His populist Partij voor de Vrijheid (PVV, Party for Freedom) had been around since 2006, hovering between 6 and 16 per cent of the vote. But suddenly, on November 22nd, he scored a whopping 24 per cent, becoming the largest party with 37 seats in the Lower House of the Dutch parliament, way ahead of the runner-up, the left-wing alliance of social democrats and greens at 25 seats.

In the Dutch electoral system, this automatically gives Geert Wilders the lead in forming a new government. And here the problem starts.

Now he wants to cash in on his victory to finally and decisively put his stamp on the country’s policies. At 60 years old, it may well be his last chance.

So far, his party has been a wallflower in the political arena. Other parties have found his standpoints too extreme to bring on board. Today, however, looks very different. As the leader of the largest political party, Geert Wilders seems destined to become Prime Minister - at least he himself claims so. It would seem like going against the will of the people to stand in his way. But still, most other parties are reluctant to work with him.

In its leader comment the morning after, the Dutch Christian daily newspaper Nederlands Dagblad recalled what kind of party and what kind of leader the country had just elected to be its next PM:

‘Geert Wilders, who for years on end has branded democratically elected colleagues traitors to their country and a fake parliament. Who called the rule of law ‘corrupted’, after he had been persecuted and fined for collective insult. Who for years on end has hatefully offended entire sections of the population, because of their faith (Muslims) or their origin (Moroccan, Eastern European etc). Who wants to abolish religious freedom, leave the European Union, do away with the euro, end the military support to Ukraine, post soldiers along the nation’s borders, ban headscarves, disband climate policy and energy transition. Who wants to revert the apologies the King made last July for the nation’s slavery record. And so on, and so on.’

In the run-up to these latest elections, Mr Wilders ran a brilliant campaign in which he presented himself in a more moderate way, and pledged if he won, to be ‘the Prime Minister of all Dutch people’ - leaving aside the question what a person needs to qualify for being ‘Dutch’. Now he wants to cash in on his victory to finally and decisively put his stamp on the country’s policies. At 60 years old, it may well be his last chance.

But if he is to lead the next government, and be successful at it, he will need to go through no less than a ‘deradicalisation programme’, the Nederlands Dagblad commentator wrote: ‘That’s the kind of test you can pass, but also fail.’

From Dutch Christians, you might say, the response to the first election victory of a populist party came in stages.

At first, many of them were shocked, dismayed, and anxious. Their faith prompted them to strive for a government that will reach out to the poor, respect minority rights, care for the environment and welcome refugees. They had always known that Mr Wilders and his party had totally opposite ideas. But they had never expected him to gain any real political influence. Now, it felt as if they had woken up in a different country.

But once some of the dust had settled down, there came room for other considerations, too. Surely not all 2.4 million PVV voters could be classified as extremists. The size of its electorate puts it rather in the range of a mainstream conservative party. Many people had voted for Mr Wilders out of disillusionment with the established parties who had governed the country for decades - and rightly so.

It is one thing to say we must welcome asylum seekers, but it is another when you can’t find a place to live, because there is a shortage of affordable housing and refugees seem to get priority. It is one thing to say the government is there to support people who need help, but it is another when you experience you’re immediately suspected of fraud when you apply for a benefit.

So Christian voters, like the general public, seem divided: some are shocked by the election result, others feel that their concerns have finally been heard.

Up until 1967 Christian political parties had a majority in the Dutch parliament. Their support has shrunk steadily, but at this election it fell from 15 per cent in 2021 to no more than 7 per cent. And yes, some of their voters defected to the populist PVV.

‘We have loved the stranger more than ourselves’, explained one of them in the Nederlands Dagblad newspaper. ‘It is better to begin at yourself; from there you can help the world. That’s what Mr Wilders stands for’.

‘What decided it for me was the insight that this country needs real change’, commented another. ‘Not just some minor adjustments, but a firm pull to the right: a stronger policy on law and order, critical on the growing influence from Europe, battling poverty in our own country.’ Several Christians mentioned they had voted PVV because Mr Wilders is a keen supporter of Israel; they were worried about the anti-semitic tones in some quite noisy pro-Palestinian demonstrations because of the war in Gaza.

So Christian voters, like the general public, seem divided: some are shocked by the election result, others feel that their concerns have finally been heard.

The surprising election result seems to leave the country - and Christians in particular - with a couple of nagging questions.

How to avoid stigmatizing PVV voters, and recognize that their problems are real and deserve solutions that are real?

How to convince them that a party that has some anti-democratic tendencies and lives in denial of the big international and environmental crises cannot be the solution? And that care for the environment, refugees and the poor are authentic components of the Christian story, and not just after all of our own personal needs have been met?