Christmas celebrations in the Holy Land have been overshadowed for the second year by the war between Israel and the Palestinian militant group Hamas in the Gaza Strip. Despite the military conflict, the local Christian community celebrates the Christmas holidays with a traditional pilgrimage from Jerusalem to Bethlehem. TASR reports according to the agencies DPA and AP.
The convoy to Bethlehem on Christmas Day was led by the highest representative of the Catholic Church in the Holy Land, the Italian Cardinal Pierbattista Pizzaballa. As a sign of solidarity, Pizzaballa also visited the only Catholic church in the Gaza Strip before Christmas, where he led the holy mass.
“The message of Bethlehem is always a message of peace and hope,” declared the mayor of the city, Anton Salman. “And these days we also send our message to the world, which is peace and hope, but we insist that the world must work to end our suffering as a Palestinian people.”
Due to the ongoing war in the Palestinian enclave, which has lasted for a year and a half, the traditional Christmas celebrations in Bethlehem, the birthplace of Jesus Christ, in the Palestinian West Bank are muted. It was the same a year ago.
Midnight mass will be held as usual in local churches. However, other traditions were abandoned, such as the lighting of a large Christmas tree in the square in front of the Church of the Nativity and from musical performances by bands from all over the world.
A large number of foreign tourists visited Bethlehem every year during the Christmas holidays. However, due to ongoing fighting, almost none are currently in the birthplace of Christ. In the pre-pandemic year of 2019, 2 million people visited the city. This year, their number dropped to 100,000.
AP reminds that Bethlehem is one of the most important Christian cities. However, Christians make up only a fraction of the 14 million inhabitants of the Holy Land. According to data from the US Department of State, approximately 182,000 of them live in Israel, 50,000 in the West Bank and Jerusalem, and only approximately 1,300 in the Gaza Strip.
