Here's one very simple and obvious suggestion that may provide some relief by putting an uncomfortable spotlight on the thugs responsible for the bullying this writer refers to.

Christians communities in the free world adopt congregations in the Holy Land or elsewhere in the Islamic world to offer them support and solidarity through correspondence, physical and financial aid, human rights monitoring, promotion of public awareness of the situation of that community and lobbying of government authorities here and in the community's homeland. There are various Christian agencies that monitor religious minority rights in the Islamic world or channel aid to them. These organizations and their work need to receive more attention and a higher public profile. Individual believers can help to provide this if they speak up.

Posted by: templar at January 11, 2007 2:34 PM

Conclusions:

1) The American government should never have put pressure on Israel to give up control of the West Bank.

2) The Israelis should never have allowed Bethlehem to become part of the territory to be administered, i.e. controlled, by the "Palestinian Authority."

3) Bethlehem should have been promptly annexed to Israel, and the Israelis, working with outside Christian groups (of the kind that are not anti-Israel) should have organized groups of Christians to come for long-term stays in Bethlehem. They should be carefully vetted so that they do not end up being seduced by Arab propaganda, but clear in their view of the world.

4) Even today, it is not too late to offer places for Arabic-speaking Christians leaving Iraq and other places in the MIddle East, to settle in Bethlehem, in place of Muslims who could be persuaded, in many ways, to leave -- one of those ways being a renewed and permanent Israeli presence in the town, clearly and vocally supported by Christians in the West, including Latin America, Asia, and Africa. Such a sign of support would help demoralize local Muslims. If, further, their own sources of support dry up, they will in the end have to leave.

Some of what could and should have been done.

Some of what could still be done.

Posted by: Hugh at January 11, 2007 3:04 PM

what this person could do being in italy is to cause a stir and tell it like it is to italian press, therefore making a stop about the mumbo jumbo idiocy of the pro-paleosimians press

Posted by: StillFedUp at January 11, 2007 3:06 PM

Templar, I would change only one thing in your presentation . . .

"Christians communities in the free world"

"Judeo-Christian communities in the free world"

We're really on the same side.

Posted by: miira at January 11, 2007 3:16 PM

A few weeks ago I posted on this subject and was taken to task for criticizing Israel's handling of the Muslim oppression of Christians especially in Nazareth. The Muslims are using the Christians as a test case. What they are doing to the Palestinian Christians today is what they plan for the Jews tommorrow.

To the Muslims, there is no real difference between the Jews and Christians. Sadly, many Israelis fail to distinguish between Christians and Muslims, simply lumping them all together as "Arabs". The end result is that indigenous Christians feel trapped between the Muslims who hate them on one side, and the Jews who could couldn't care less if they are destroyed on the other. This must change.

Israel must redefine the conflict as between THREE equal parties, NOT two!

The only REAL Palestinians are Christians, Jews, and Samaritans. The Muslims are just Arab invaders. Israel (and us at JW/DW) should use "Palestinian" only in this regard.

There should be a Palestinian state in Judea, Samaria and Nazareth for the Christians. This state will be in federation with Israel. The Muslims will have Jordan and should be humanely transferred there. Once this is done, Israel will no longer need to mar the land with ugly walls since the Jordan river will be a naturally defendable boundary.

A Jewish Israel with a Christian minority, a Christian Palestine with a Jewish minority and a Christian Lebanon (after the Partition of that country) will form an strong economic free trade block as well as a powerful alliance for mutual defence. Christian Cyprus can also be invited to join.

This is the only chance for Israel to overcome the Muslim demographic time bomb and for the Christian community to survive. It is clearly in Israel's interest to have strong allies contiguous to them instead of the Muslim terrorist entities now on their borders. For this to happen, Israel must have a leaderhip with vision. Unfortunately, at the present time Israel is led by corrupt dhimmis like Olmert. Let's hope she wakes up before it's too late.

Posted by: Provoslavni at January 11, 2007 3:19 PM

Hugh,

You posted your excellent analysis above while I was writing mine. I believe they are both consistent and compatible with each other. Nice to be singing from the same songbook.

Posted by: Provoslavni at January 11, 2007 3:23 PM

The plight of the Christians in the Holy Land is so sad and possibly irreversible. While there is plenty of blame to go around, I point a finger at the Vatican as one of the institutions responsible for this situation. I say this as a practicing Catholic. PLO Patriarch Michael Sabbah should have been removed a long time ago by the Vatican, as well as the flunkie priests who went along with his slobbering affections and stooge-like support for the late Yassar Arafat and his band of murderous successors. The Vatican should have had, in place, strong men who were true shepherds for their flock. This would have meant confronting Israeli policies at times. More often, it would have meant challenging the PLO and Islamists face to face, without flinching and without apology. Now, as it stands, it seems that I will have to show my grandchildren old travel books of the places in the Holy Land. The real places will be dar-el Islam, with burnt-out churches, monasteries that have been turned into stables, poorly built mosques on every corner, and filthy, crumbling streets filled with burqa-clad women and their gun-slinger men. Oh yes, and those same inhabitants will STILL want money and aid from us, despite the fact that they destroyed some of our most precious religious sites.

Posted by: maryrose at January 11, 2007 3:36 PM

Pathetic, Israel will do nothing at all to help Christians being persecuted by Mohammadans.

637,000 google hits for Christian Persecution Palestine and the Republican Congress and Administration has never said a word about this, not even Pat Robertson spoke of it on his TV show....hmmm, must be the lure of Saudi oil money that buys silence (or Liberian diamond mines in the case of Pat Robertson).

From ON line Journal The Palestinian Christian - persecuted, betrayed from a Palestinian Christian

The Palestinian Christian is an endangered species.

When the modern state of Israel was established there were about 400,000 of us. Two years ago the number was down to 80,000. Now it’s down to 60,000. At that rate, in a few years there will be none of us left. When this happens non-Christian groups will move into our churches and claim them forever.

Palestinian Christians within Israel fare little better. On the face of it, their number has grown by 20,000 since 1991. But this is misleading, for the census classification “Christian” includes some 20,000 recent non-Arab migrants from the former Soviet Union.
Advertisement

So why are Palestinian Christians abandoning their homeland?

We have lost hope, that’s why. We are treated as non-people. Few outside the Middle East even know we exist, and those who do, conveniently forget.

I refer, of course, to the American Religious Right. They see modern Israel as a harbinger of the Second Coming, at which time Christians will go to paradise, and all others (presumably including Jews) to hell. To this end they lend military and moral support to Israel.

Even by the double-dealing standards of international diplomacy this is a breathtakingly cynical bargain. It is hard to know who is using whom more: the Christian Right for offering secular power in the expectation that the Jewish state will be destroyed by a greater spiritual one; or the Israeli Right for accepting their offer. What we do know is that both sides are abusing the Palestinians. Apparently we don’t enter into anyone’s calculations.

The views of the Israeli Right are well known: they want us gone.

Less well known are the views of the American Religious Right. Strangely, they find the liberation of Iraqis from a vile dictator just, but do not find it unjust for us to be under military occupation for 38 long years.

Said Senator James Inhofe (Rep.,Oklahoma): “God Appeared to Abraham and said: ‘I am giving you this land’, the West Bank. This is not a political battle at all. It is a contest over whether or not the word of God is true.”

Inhofe must have got it wrong. Promises are being made to earthly Jerusalem that God did not make. The Holy Land was promised to Abraham, Isaac, Jacob and their descendants, as stated in the Bible. These are the Palestinian Muslims, Christians and Jews, who have been living in the land for thousands of years. The Bible never mentioned that God promised it solely to Jews. Anyone can be a Jew, but not anyone can be a descendant of Abraham, Isaac, Jacob and their descendants. James Inhofe and followers are unable to tell the difference between Jew, Israelite and Israel.

House Majority Leader Dick Armey (Rep.,Texas) was even more forthright: “I'm content to have Israel grab the entire West Bank … I happen to believe that the Palestinians should leave.”

There is a phrase for this. Ethnic cleansing.

Silencing us, from seeking your support and enlightening you about our suffering, goes counter to what Jesus has mandated us to do. We all know that Muslims and Jews get ceaseless support (political, spiritual and financial) from Saudi Arabia and America respectively, while Palestinian Christians get nothing from Australian and other Western “Christian” governments. (The Pope has been an exception.)

Prior to the 1967 war, the Christian youth at the Lutheran, Baptist, Methodist and other churches in Bethlehem used to pray and rejoice and have a good chat with hundreds of American Christian pilgrims. In particular Texas and California were two places from where many came to visit the Holy Land. Today only fading memories prevail. Bethlehem has been vacated by Christian families. The remaining Christians are paying the price by experiencing curfews which last for weeks. They remain sandwiched between Muslims and Jews without drawing the slightest concern from the many so-called Western Christians.

So why do American Christians stand by while their leaders advocate the expulsion of fellow Christians? Could it be that they do not know that the Holy Land has been a home to Christians since, well … since Christ?

Do not think I am asking for special treatment for Christians. Ethnic cleansing is evil whoever does it and to whomever it is done. Palestinian Christians - Anglican, Maronite Catholics, Orthodox, Lutherans, Armenians, Baptists, Copts and Assyrians - have been rubbing shoulders with each other and with other religions - Muslims, Jews, Druze and (most recently) Baha’is - for centuries. And we want to do so for centuries more. But we can’t if we are driven out by despair.

We are equally frightened by those who commit suicide bombings. None of us Christians have condoned it or even contemplated the idea. Our commitment to Jesus’ teachings will never shake our resolve in this matter.

American journalist Anders Strindberg makes a clearer conclusion. He says Palestinians are equated with Islamists, Islamists with terrorists. And presumably because all organised Christian activity among Palestinians is non-political and non-violent, the community hardly ever hits western headlines. Suicide bombers sell more copy than people who congregate for Bible study.

What we seek is support: material, moral, political and spiritual. As Palestinians we grieve for what we have lost, and few people have lost more than us (the Ashkenazi Jews are one). But grief can be assuaged by the fellowship of friends.

Posted by: Nariz at January 11, 2007 3:50 PM

" The American government should never have put pressure on Israel to give up control of the West Bank."

...or southern Lebanon,Sinai, or the hills surrounding Israel.....

Posted by: exsgtbrown at January 11, 2007 3:55 PM

I'm not sure, Nariz, why Israel should care about the Christians in the Palestinian Territories given that those Christians plus their friends in the diaspora are loudly anti-Israel. All the Catholic and Orthodox Arabs I have ever come across in the US and the UK are viciously anti-Israel. If you throw your lot in with the Muslims and the politics of Arab nationalism, what can you expect from Israel?

Posted by: Luz at January 11, 2007 4:43 PM

Hugh

'West Bank' and Bethlehem are one thing, but Robert's correspondent above is complaining about the situation in Nazareth, which is in Israel proper, but now infested with Mohammedans. If that's the way Israel is handling Christians in its own territory, how would annexing Bethlehem, or even Jericho, Hebron and Nablus, make things any better for Christians?

This sort of dhimmitude from the Israeli government is disgraceful. The only Israelis who have it right are the ones who advocate what they call the 'Transfer' solution i.e. expel all Palestinians out of the Holy Land. That would mean all Muslims, as well as Islamo-Christians; only pro-Israeli Christians should be allowed to remain.

Posted by: Infidel Pride at January 11, 2007 5:20 PM

World Net Daily have an article about what the Christians in Nazareth have to endure.

http://www.wnd.com/news/article.asp?ARTICLE_ID=53574

Posted by: Mike_W at January 11, 2007 5:25 PM

"Israel (and us at JW/DW) should use "Palestinian" only in this regard."

Someone at this used the phrase "pseudostinian". It seems to be a more accurate descriptor for the islamic(arab) squatters.

Posted by: squire at January 11, 2007 5:35 PM

Hugh, Provoslavni & alii

I, a Lebanese Greek-Rum (Orthodox or Catholic, it doesn't matter, my ancestors were Orthodox then converted to Catholocism then became Orthodox again), cannot but feel pitty for members of our Greek-Rum genos in Nazareth, Bethleem, Jerusalem, Beth-Jala and elsewhere in Palestine and even Israel (Orthodox, Catholics or Latins since Latins are originally Orthodox converts).

Nobody can imagine the predicament they live in, and not only that situation described above by the Nazarene but also the continuous historical situation they have passed through, except someone who specializes in the history of the Greek-Rum people like myself.

Can you imagine a whole people suffering dhimmitude for 1300 years and finally been deprived of his own Greek-Rum history and identity been replaced by a fake Arab identity and history, by the same identity of his opressor. For me, considering non-Muslim ex-dhimmis living in their ancestral, now Arabic-speaking Islamic lands as Arabs is a sort of ethnic cleansing. A whole ethnic identity is wiped up on the map.

I am talking about this imposed Arab identity because it is part of the problem. There would be no problem if Christian Palestinians become Arab and merge into one Arab society with Muslim Arabs provided reciprocity from the part of Muslims and equality between the two. But since Palestinian Muslims see their Christian neighbours as dhimmis and as inferiors to them, it is hard to imagine that those Christians can become Arabs in this manner.

You might wonder why I don't consider Palestinian Christians as Arabs despite the fact that they consider themselve so. The reason is that the Arab identity was imposed on them after 1840 although not by force. Before 1840 most Christian Palestinians did not identify as Arabs but they identified as Orthodox Greeks (Rum), Catholic Greek (Rum) and Latins. Many were illiterate and their level of education was low. They formed a fertile ground upon which Protestant, Catholic and Russian missionaries were able to easily plant their political ideas. By 1840, all these missionaries agreed on the fact that all the people of Palestine were Arabs except the Jews. One of the main missions of these missionaries was to create a scientific and literary renaissance among the "Arabs" something through which the Arabs will go back to their past glories of Avicenna and Averroes (and you know what I mean). Many of these European and Russian diplomats and missionaries beleived faithfully in this idea. Many also beleived that the "revival" of science and reason among "Arabs" (and they used to emphasize on the Arabs not on Turks) will serve the interest of their countries (mainly, France, Britain and Russia).

The Russian wanted total domination over the Holy Lands since the Patriarchate of Jerusalem and most Christian monuments in the Holy Land were under the hand of Orthodox Greeks most of whom originated from Greece and Istanbul. The Russians classified the Greeks of the Holy Land as: "Greeks", i.e. those who originate from Greece, Cyprus and Asia Minor and who spoke Greek, and "Arabs", i.e. the locals. After 1860, the Russian dominated the schools of the Greek community in Palestine. It was in these schools that the Russians taught the local Christians to identify as Arabs they taught them also that the non-local Greeks were ethnically different from them which created a schism in the Greek Orthodox Patriarchy of Jerusalem still lasting until now. Further, the Russians eliminated the study of the Greek language in these schools and replaced it with Arabic and Russian. The Greek language has been studied and spoken in the Holy Land since the time of Alexander of Macedon. Gaza, Ascalon, Ashdod, Yafa, Akka, Bethsan, Sebastia and Jerusalem were cities which spoke Greek and contributed to Greek litterature. The Russians eliminated the language of Aristotle and replaced it with the languages of Muhammad and Peter the Great. After the Soviet Revolution 1917, the Russians lost control of the schools and the Russian language ceased to be taught, what was left were people indentifying as "Arab Orthodox" and ready to ally themselve with whatever "Arab cause". Surely, this enhanced their anti-Semitism.

Other missionaries used the same Arabist rhetoric as the Russians, and the same results showed on Latins, Greek Catholics and Protestants.

Askenazi Jews picked and abided by the same Arabist rhetoric used in Europe, their original environment. No wonder why the Israeli do not trust these Christians because they consider them Arabs supported by the fact that these Christians identify as Arabs and show anti-Semitic attitudes.

What we see here is that a whole people was first eliminated on paper and now is being eliminated for real.

Posted by: Berytius_Libanicus at January 11, 2007 6:23 PM

There are christians who wholeheartedly support the jews. Others do not. Those who curse Israel are cursed themselves.

Posted by: callmeinfidel at January 11, 2007 6:43 PM

Libanicus, Provoslavni, Nariz, etc.:

This thread greatly interests me, for I am an Evangeliical Christian who does NOT hold to the Dispensational Premillennial Eschatology (the doctrinal nexus that makes so many of my brethren pro-Israel).

The justice of the Israeli position, I argue, is based on stewardship of the land, the clear unwelcome the Jews experienced everywhere after WWII, and the pressures which Arab nationalism placed on the Mizrahim in places like Iraq, Egypt, and the Maghreb, and the disgusting treatment of the Jews under the traditionalist regime in Yemen, rather than anything eschatological.

Yet is the position of the ME Christians truly hopeless? The ME Christians know Arabic, and are uniquely gifted to refute the errors and blasphemies of the Qu'ran. As Arabic speakers who sometimes retain Aramaic for liturgical purposes, they have a leg up on learning Biblical Hebrew which we Indo-European-, Sinitic-, and Korean-speaking Christians lack. Maybe the time has come for a counter-witness to the Muslims.

And it is time for Washington and other Western capitals to speak up on behalf of the ME Christians.

But I also pray that a Christian revival will break out in the ME. And I pray that the grace of God in Christ (who is God Incarnate and who gave himself to atone for our sins on the cross) would greatly touch those millions whose native languages are non-Levantine Arabic, Turkish, Persian, Indo-Aryan, etc. etc. as well as those of Rumi, Aramaean, Armenian, and Coptic stock.

Posted by: Kepha at January 11, 2007 8:39 PM

Provoslavni,

I remember the topic from a couple of weeks ago...

Here is an article from Newsday, 12/31/06. I think I linked to it then, but don't quite remember:

http://www.newsday.com/features/printedition/longislandlife/ny-licov5032289dec31,0,4901547.story

Read the article and the comments. Notice how the Antiochan Orthodox Reverend behaves as a dhimmi in his comments response.

How can anyone expect the Israelis not to lump the Christians with the Muslims, when the public representatives and leaders of the Christians themselves side consistently with the Muslims?

Posted by: del at January 11, 2007 8:53 PM

Berytius_Libanicus, del, Kepha, Nariz, et al...

I live (and worship) within a Palestinian Christian exile community. Most are originally from Ramallah, Bethlehem, Jerusalem or the Nazareth triangle. A few are from Amman or Ma'an, Jordan. Most describe themselves correctly as Arabic, not as Arabs. The first is a linguistic term, the second is cultural/racial.

Many can trace their family trees back to the time of Christ where their ancestors were among those Jews who became Christians under the apostles. This means they are the original Christians of the New Testament. Of course there has been intermarriage with Greeks and others over the last two millenia.

Although they now speak Arabic until just a few hundred years ago Palestinian Christians (and Jews) spoke Aramaic (West Syriac) at home.

Interestingly, Palestinian Christians from Ramallah and Bethlehem tend to be pro-Israel, although they don't express it publicly for obvious reasons. The Christians who are more anti-Israel are those in Israel itself. This is mostly due to discrimination by Jews (now, thankfully, becoming less common) but also out of resentment at being lumped in with poor ignorant Muslims. It was Israel who legally defined them as Arabs and so it's hard to blame them now for this self-identification.

As for Ramallah, this town was founded by Christians and was almost exclusively Christian before 1917. Under the British mandate and later under Jordan, the prosperous Christians hired Muslims from across the Jordan river as cheap labour. Unfortunately, this poor Muslim guest workers stayed on in Judea and Samaria and outbred the indigenous Christians, many of whom had left for the West and were now absentee landlords. When Israel took the West Bank, they favoured the Muslims or the more educated Christians because they foolishly thought these poor uneducated Muslims would be more easy to control.

The late mayor of Bethlehem, Elias Freij, even begged the Israelis to annex Bethlehem and Ramallah into Israel as self-governing Christian cantons. Israel, under pressure from the US State Department, refused to even consider his petition. Israel was sowing the wind and now they are reaping the whirlwind.

Posted by: Provoslavni at January 11, 2007 9:34 PM

Typo in 5th paragraph above... should read:

When Israel took the West Bank, they favoured the Muslims OVER the more educated Christians because they foolishly thought these poor uneducated Muslims would be more easy to control

Posted by: Provoslavni at January 11, 2007 9:37 PM

What a depressing note. The only thing for people like this to do is leave-the US certainly can't do anything and Israel's current "leadership" is so dismal that expecting help from it is suicidal.
This must be how the people of Constantinople felt in 1453 before the barbarians overran the city. People like this should be allowed to seek asylum in the West, for they really are victims of oppression.

Posted by: ISLAMSFORLOSERS at January 11, 2007 11:04 PM

Miira noted:

"Judeo-Christian communities in the free world"

We're really on the same side.

Thanx for the correction, Miira. You're right, of course. :)

Posted by: templar at January 12, 2007 12:30 AM

The quote attributed by Pravoslavni to the late Mayor Freij of Bethlehem is true. As an Israeli diplomat I escorted the correspondent of Le Monde to interview the Mayor in Bethlehem. The Frenchman heard with amazement Mr Freij complaining that Moshe Dayan was not responding to his request that Bethlehem be annexed to Jerusalem, and then turned furiously to me claiming that Israel had bribed the Mayor to be pro-Israeli...

Mr Freij answered with an aphorism:

Baad a- Sabt biji Yom al-Ahad(In Arabic: after Saturday comes Sunday)

He explained that to mean that after the Moslems -"the Friday people" finish destroying the Jews -"the Saturday people" ,they will attack the Christians -"the Sunday people"....

The Frenchman did not print this as it was against the preconceptions of Le Monde.

Posted by: Yerushalmi at January 12, 2007 5:05 AM

Was that Le Monde correspondent Eric Rouleau?

Posted by: Hugh at January 12, 2007 6:35 AM

Berytius_Libanicus--

Your post above is full of all kinds of keen observations and historical information that is, in many ways, invaluable.

Posted by: Hugh at January 12, 2007 6:38 AM

What a depressing note. The only thing for people like this to do is leave-the US certainly can't do anything and Israel's current "leadership" is so dismal that expecting help from it is suicidal.

[...]

Posted by: ISLAMSFORLOSERS at January 11, 2007 11:04 PM

ISLAMSFORLOSERS:

Agreed that Ohmert & Co are pretty dismal, but despite the claims of Meersheim & Walt and others, it is Israel's domestic policies that have been as much shaped by its patrons and its enemies as it has been by internal forces and considerations. Whether they intervene or keep their noses out of things, they will be soundly criticised by all the usual suspects who always cast anything the Israelis do in the worst possible light. Remember the crime of "disproportional response"?

I deeply regret the persecution that the Palestinian Christians are suffering, but it is really up to its church leaders like Michael Saba and Naim Attik and, externally, Pope Benedict to say something. Considering what a gormless idiot the Archbishop of Canterbury is, however, best he keep his yap shut.

Posted by: waterdragon52 at January 12, 2007 8:41 AM

Yerushalmi,

Thanks for the confirmation. This seems to be common knowledge among Palestinian Christians but, as far as I know, has never been reported in the English language press. Friej was the last true Palestinian statesman who at the end of his life was relegated to the humiliating position of Tourism Minister of the PA.

It is no wonder that many Palestinian Christians feel that Israel betrayed them to the Muslims. Many Christians openly say that while they may share a language with Arabs, they share a common morality with Jews.

Let's pray that Israel will soon dump Olmert and get some leadership that can forge a natural alliance between Jews and indigenous Christians. This will also mean that some real Palestinian Christian statesmen must be found and promoted. Sadly, such vision seems to be lacking among both Christians and Jews.

Posted by: Provoslavni at January 12, 2007 11:12 AM

I think we're going to see the destruction of Israel within our lifetime. The Israeli elites really don't understand they're enemy and they no longer fight against them (Hamas and Hizb'allah). No they're failing to protect their own citizens within their borders. The government is supposed to be a terror to evildoers. They don't bear the sword for nothing. If they won't wield it, someone else will. In this case, the Muslims are more than willing.

Posted by: PRCalDude at January 12, 2007 12:42 PM

Why is it that Israel doesn't care about Nazareth?

Posted by: EliasAlucard at January 13, 2007 3:37 AM

Hugh and others,
If at all possible please try and research the Vatican, Greek Orthodox (even to this day) and Britain's Anglican Church behaviour with respect to Israel before the era of the internet.
There is this Dhimmiwatch post from 2005 which does present some facts relevant to this current post:
Jerusalem Patriarch praises Abbas, criticizes Israel

http://www.jihadwatch.org/dhimmiwatch/archives/009525.php

For example does anyone remember when Bishop Hilarion Cappucci smuggled arms across the Lebanese Israeli border in his official car, for the PLO, that very organization that massacred Christians in Lebanon, and the reaction of the Vatican to his sentencing to a term of imprisonment by the Israelis?
How should Israelis react to Christian Muslim tensions in the region given the behaviour of the Church to their own in favouring the agressors at the behest of realpolitik?

Posted by: Cynic at January 13, 2007 7:26 AM

Pravo, I know that some --or many-- Bethlehem Christians felt and feel betrayed by Israel for Israel having allowed arafat to take over Bethlehem which has led to suffering for the pre-December 1995 population in that town. But bear in mind Pravo, that it was Shim`on Peres who gave up Bethlehem to arafat and that this occurred shortly after Clinton spoke to Peres about this matter at Rabin's funeral. Clinton asked Peres why Israel had not fulfilled its commitment under Oslo I or Oslo II or both to hand over the Arab cities in Judea-Samaria to arafat's palestinian authority. Peres hastened to do Clinton's bidding. Nevertheless, Clinton forgot that the Arab side, that is, arafat's gang, had commitments under the Oslo I and II accords that the Arab side had not kept. Apparently, that did not bother Clinton or he was extremely poorly informed.

Next, on why the Bethlehem area was not annexed to Israel [or to Jerusalem, as I think Freij was really asking]. Now, you write that Israel "refused to even consider his [Freij's] petition" to join the Bethlehem area to the Jerusalem municipality. That is not so. Israel did consider it and I believe that some officials favored this proposal. However, as Yerushalmi's account shows, the opposition to the proposal came from Moshe Dayan, then defense minister and in charge of the military government of the area. Now, Dayan was very conciliatory towards American State Dept demands and requests. So his actions do not reflect a thoughtful consideration of Israel's interests. And I believe that others in the govt at the time were favorable to Freij's proposal. Dayan had undeserved influence in the govt at that time, unfortunately. His reputation today is very dim and he is not considered a hero. He was not the hero of the 6-Day War. In fact, he was appointed minister of defense only in the weeks leading up to the war [after having been out of the army for several years] as a way of reassuring the public. Rabin and PM Eshkol were the ones who built up the army before that war. Nor did Dayan play a command role in the war.

So much for the Bethlehem issue. Of course, the Middle Eastern and Israeli political situations have been very complex for a very long time. The British contributed their usual monkey wrench to the works. After British occupation of the country in 1917-1918, "British officers also played a role in the founding of the Moslem-Christian Association, the first post-war Arab organization" in the country [H M Sachar, A History of Israel (1976), p168]. Yehoshua Porat makes the point even more strongly in his book on palestinian Arab nationalism. The main purpose of the MCA was to oppose Zionism. That is, British officials organized Arabs to oppose what was official British policy. In the course of this endeavor, they joined the Arabic-speaking Christians to the Muslims, obviating an independent Christian policy. Another development during the period of British occupation that came back to harm the Christians in the country was that many of them became attracted to the palestine Communist Party. Now, the Commuist movement [led by the Comintern] favored Muslim and Arab-Muslim national movements and peoples against non-Muslim and/or Muslim non-Arab peoples [i.e., Arabs vs Kurds, Arabs vs Jews, Turks vs Armenians, etc.].
http://ziontruth.blogspot.com/2005/10/bolsheviks-for-jihad-genocide-stalins.html
This was a strange convergence of Communist policy with British imperial policy. At any rate, although we can understand dhimmi support for an ostensibly non-Muslim party ostensibly advocating ethnic equality and friendship of peoples [druzhba narodov], this meant that Communists from the Christian communities were not working for their own communities. To this day, many or most of the leading politicians among the Arabic-speaking Christians in Israel are Communists or come from a Communist background. Consider Ramzi Jeraisy, mayor of Nazareth. He is mayor by a bare majority of one vote in the city council. His backers include Muslm Communists or ex-Communists who are opposed to the Islamic movement that has nearly half the seats on the council. So he can't openly criticize the Islamic movement. But he does criticize Israel profusely. And when Muslim attack Christians in Nazareth he blames Israel and not the Muslims.
Then there's Azmi Bishara, raised as a Communist, recipient of a scholarship to study in Communist East Germany. He is now part of an Arab nationalist party. He too will not criticize the Muslims as such. But he loves to condemn Israel. By the way, Azmi [whose family name means Gospel] doesn't live in Nazareth. He lives in the Jewish town adjacent to Nazareth called Upper Nazareth. I'm sure he has liberal police protection because many of the Jews in his town hate him. So he doesn't experience the same abuse as do the Christians living in Nazareth.
Now, what do you expect Israel to do when the political leadership of the Christian community constantly criticizes Israel and fails to show concern for their own community? Of course, I agree that the Israeli govt has to enforce the law and protect the citizens in any case. But when the governmental leaders are weak in character in any case and constantly under international criticism for oppressing and persecuting poor Muslims, blah blah, they are going to take the line of least resistance and not to intervene.
What is needed is an international campaign calling on Israel explicitly to protect the Christian population from Muslim persecution. The Vatican did something like that about 7 years ago when they wanted to stop building of a mosque in Nazareth near the Chuch of the Annunciation on a piece of ground falsely claimed by the Islamic movement to be the location of a Muslim's shaykh's tomb. The Vatican had Franciscan monks demonstrating in favor of getting rid of the temporary mosque that the Islamists had built there. And the Israeli govt acted. The monks later demonstrated to thank the govt. Now, a similar campaign is needed, not to excoriate Israel, but to ask for curbing the Muslim persecution of Christians in Nazareth and elsewhere. Such a movement would have to oppose the State Dept too, which would try to confuse the issue, deny the facts, and head off practical action to protect the Nazareth Christians.

Posted by: Eliyahu at January 14, 2007 7:25 AM

Eliyahu,

As usual, I appreciate your clarifications and agree with your conclusions. I am also pleased to learn that some Israeli statesmen did not favour the US State Department/Dayan sellout. It's unfortunate they didn't prevail.

It makes no sense Palestinian Christians (most of whom are very business oriented) to support the Communists. This is exactly what I mean by saying that some real Palestinian Christian statesmen must be found and promoted.

Yerushalmi as a diplomat, and you should both strongly consider running for office in the next election round. Israel desperately needs elected officials who understand the real situation.

Posted by: Provoslavni at January 14, 2007 7:56 PM

One last point.

Perhaps a specifically Palestinian Christian political party could be organized and financed in Nazareth and Bethlehem along the lines of the Lebanese Phalangists. This "Kataeb Filistin" would at least give the Christians a viable alternative to the Communists or other self-appointed dhimmi leaders.

Posted by: Provoslavni at January 14, 2007 10:41 PM