Letter from Bethlehem (43)

Toine van Teeffelen

December 28, 2002

As expected, the curfew is lifted on Tuesday 24 December, the day when the Latin (Roman Catholic) Patriarch traditionally enters Bethlehem for the Christmas celebrations. The day and night before, however, varous Bethlehem buildings were occupied by the army including the house of the director of Holy Land Trust, Sami Awad, and an apartment building in which Elias' son in law has a beauty shop. At one of the busiest days of the year, he had to open the doors for the soldiers who left it only early in the morning of December 24. There is a subdued mood in town. Several organizations in Bethlehem – Holy Land Trust, Arab Educational Institute, Wi'am, Bethlehem Bible College and the Arab Orthodox Society – decided to have a demonstration in front of the Church of Nativity along the route of the Patriarch. During the Patriarch's entry we are standing in our best clothes holding signs stating "end the occupation," "curfews equal detention camps," and "Silent Night, Holy Night?" - a reference to the silence imposed by the curfews. Mary and her sisters from France who have come over for Christmas, join us, as well as some of Mary's colleagues from the university. Jara wants to carry a wooden demonstration sign all by herself. The Nativity Square is full of people although less than during a normal Christmas. We are filmed by many TV and photo cameras in the background to the Patriarch's entry. Minutes later, hundreds of Israelis from the organization Ta'ayush (living together) march into the square in the footsteps of the Patriarch, so to speak. Surprisingly, they were able to cross the main Bethlehem-Jerusalem checkpoint. Bishara Awad, director of the Bethlehem Bible College, gives them a demonstration sign that is first met with surprise and then accepted. Mary is happy to see the Israelis: "It gives a feeling that it is possible to live together and to have peace once in the future." I am struck by the many youths among the marchers. Usually members of the Israeli peace movement are older. I join some of those who participated in the Palestinian demonstration and visit a nearby restaurant. During lunch, some youths read texts from the Bible and Koran.

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During the evening before Christmas, we prepare a very good meal with special food from Paris. The house is full of Christmas decorations and Santa Claus sculptures, to the point that I feel as if we somehow try to compensate indoors for what we lack outdoors. Also, reality looks perhaps less gloomy on a full stomach. We enjoy talking until deep in the night. Never did Jara receive so many presents as during these days. The family suggests her to give a present to other children in Bethlehem and she agrees. In the afternoon of Christmas day, the family visits the tomb of my deceased father-in-law. Mary, her mother and sisters cry. Jara embraces the tomb slab and lovingly puts her head against it. She still very much misses her grandfather who died two years ago.

Later in the afternoon, I join the traditional Christmas candle procession in Beit Sahour which over the years has turned into a political march. This time the protest is not only directed at the occupation but also at the separation wall which is in the process of being erected between Palestinians from the West Bank and Israelis. Many people - several hundreds - warm themselves with red-white Santa Claus' hats and lighted candles, and listen to tapes of Christmas songs of the Lebanese singer Fairouz who sings them in an appropriately solemn, almost somber timbre. It starts raining heavily, too heavily. After walking for two kilometers, we enter the courtyard of a Beit Sahouri church to finish the demonstration which was originally planned to go to the Jerusalem-Bethlehem checkpoint. Ghassan Andoni of Rapprochement, the main organizer, announces new marches to come.

During the morning of the second Christmas day we turn out to have a serious heating problem. Tamer has a cold and a cough, and we are unable to heat the house sufficiently because of a shortage of gas. Most houses or shops here do not have central heating and are not well isolated. The car which normally brings gas cylinders does not come. It seems that a (not politically related) explosion at a chemical plant in Haifa last week is responsible for the shortage. In Al-Khader, to the south of Bethlehem, some people even fight for the spare gas. Mary's cousins tell her that at present many families face a heating problem. Fortunately, the weather slowly takes a turn to the better. We don't have much time to enjoy the second Christmas day, though. At two in the afternoon we suddenly hear of a newly imposed and unannounced curfew. The soldiers start 'cleaning the streets' from Nativity Square, shooting teargas and live bullets. 'Isam, a cousin of Mary, happens to be outside near the shooting and inhales so much teargas that for five minutes he can't breathe well and almost chokes. Many people taking a Christmas meal in a restaurant are rushing home. Although I am calm by nature, rebellious feelings come up: Who on earth has the right in such a way to drive people like animals into their homes? The curfew remains in force for the rest of the day and night. To everybody's surprise, and again unannounced, the curfew is lifted in the course of Friday morning, "until further notice." Bethlehem University remains closed, apparently because the opening announcement came too late to inform faculty and students in time. On the street I meet a university professor who tells me that during opening times she prefers to walk, in order to get some movement and feel free. She regrets that the university did not open its doors, even though it would have been only for part of the day. Continuing our daily life and work is a form of resistance, she once told me.

My institute is linking up with other community organizations. The scheduled march on Saturday commemorating the massacre of the innocent children in Jesus' times as well as the fallen among the present-day Palestinian children is cancelled. Under these circumstances it is not advisable to have children walking on the street in a semi-political march. Instead, a children's entertainment hour will be held at the Peace Center Saturday afternoon. Mary and I are making plans for the coming days. With our family from Paris present it is a most suitable period to finally arrange the baptism for Tamer. January 1 seems a good target day because we may expect that on that day the army will not curfew the town. A friend of Mary says that anything that helps to cheer up the people, like a baptism reception, is good news. With the restaurant we make the arrangement that the reception can be cancelled without charge in case a last-minute curfew is imposed.

Right now, Bethlehem organizations and religious and civil authorities are heading for the Justice and Peace march on Tuesday December 31. Demonstrators are asked to go to the checkpoint and "turn it into a place of prayer," a suggestion in fact made by the Latin Patriarch in his latest Christmas message.