This is one of the gifts of involving ourselves in the 'Barbaric' cultures of the Middle East. It apparently doesn't bother them, but were I Christian, I would be outraged at a people who allow this to happen to the most Holy land of Christianity. Years ago, I advised that the United States, preparing to go to Yugoslovia and try to negotiate 'Peace' there, should take two Policemen and enough handcuffs for each of the leaders. "If you want peace, then arrest and handcuff all leaders present for the murder of fellow humans. Only when these men have been removed, can peace occur." Subsequently, and despite all the chatting they did, there was no semblance of peace UNTIL this was done.
As for the Middle East circus, I do not believe peace is so easy to attain. In order to have peace, America should take a crate of revolvers and shells, call all who have land or religious disputes to a valley, pass out one gun and two clips to each person, let all those who want peace come and surround them as observers on the hills, and tell them have at it. Only letting this psychosis eliminate itself from their defective gene pool by such means, can any Nation in the Middle-East hope to have peace. These are a barbaric people, savage and brutish in nature, and evolved humans should have them eliminated by allowing them to have the fruits of their social philosophy in one swoop, bestial act of violence.
After we bulldoze the bodies over, the Jews who don't think they are God's chosen people possessing the right to murder non-Jews, and Moslems, who don't hold the Jihad as a virtuous act, can sit down and begin to raise themselves up as creative and 'ciivilized' peoples, now able to interract in commerce, trade and the arts with other humans. This, "But your great-great-grandfather shot my great-great grandfather, nah, nah, nah!" nonsense is destroying all it touches. That it is being allowed to desecrate the Christian sanctuary of Bethlehem is a disgrace and a sad commentary on America's involvement in this affair.
Recall, the WTC bombings occured because the United States insisits on supporting Israel with WMD while simultaneously condemning the possession of the same devices by non-Jews. It's more than inconsistent and a waste of our hard-earned money; it's tainted with suggestion of such terms as 'accomplice'. So here is the state of affairs in the Christian Holy Land for you to read.
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Last update - 02:48 25/12/2003
No Christmas cheer in caged-in Bethlehem
By Arnon Regular and Amos Harel

Bethlehem, encircled by its occupation army, woke up to another bleak Christmas
Eve. "It's a little better than last year, but only just," said Hanna Nasser,
the mayor of Jesus' birthplace. "Pilgrims come for a few hours and leave, and
there's no holiday spirit. The town is under closure and its north is paralyzed,
because of the building of the separation fence," he said.

Nasser said 1,200 pilgrims spent last night in Bethlehem, compared to 50,000 for
every day of the holidays in 2000, when they packed hotels newly built for the
Millennium. Around 15,000 tourists are expected to visit Bethlehem between the
present Catholic Christmas and the Armenian festival on January 18, he said.

Five months ago IDF troops retreated from the city and the PA assumed security
authority. But army roadblocks still cage in Bethlehem's 140,000 residents and
adjacent villages. The massive barrier going up along the northern part have
left the residents with little hope of deliverance from isolation and
impoverishment. All this has also kept away all but a few of the most intrepid
pilgrims.

There was little sign of Christmas cheer except for the forlorn bulbs dangling
on a towering tree outside the Church of the Nativity. Bleak shop windows were
filled with neglected displays of lively wooden Christmas carvings.

"There has been no work here for three years because there are no tourists,"
said Caroline Mickel, standing with arms folded outside her family souvenir
shop. A few small tour groups arrived but slipped quickly inside the Church of
the Nativity for Mass without looking in the shops.

The government said it had relaxed military blockades in the West Bank to make
it easier for Christian Palestinians and foreigners to reach Bethlehem. For the
first time since the intifada began, fir trees appeared in a few places and some
restaurants were half full.

The Bethlehem hotel, accommodating mainly journalists and PA officials, reached
50 percent occupancy yesterday - something of a Christmas miracle.

Around 10,000 people gathered in Manger Square to watch the traditional pre-Mass
procession of clergymen led by Michel Sabbah, the Roman Catholic Patriarch in
the Holy Land, plus a a fife-and-drum scouts band.

However, most of the spectators turned out to be unarmed Palestinian security
and plainclothes men, scores of journalists and impecunious locals, rather than
the cheery foreign pilgrims who once poured into Bethlehem and swelled the
town's coffers.

"People used to spend the whole year in anticipation of Christmas. Now Christmas
is like any other day," taxi driver Naef Al-Moadi said of the gloomy mood.

But despite its severe economic crisis and 30 percent unemployment, there are
signs that Bethlehem may be starting to recover a little from the intifada. The
Israeli closure on the city does make it difficult for residents to move, and
only five or six pilgrim buses arrive per day, but life seems to be continuing.

"We are both suffering from a tourism crisis but Israel could at least allow
Arab Christians from the West Bank, Gaza, and inside the Green Line to come and
help Bethlehem revive," said Arda Bamia, who is in charge of marketing tourism
in the PA.

The shops at Manger Square, starved of customers, were draped in protest banners
saying "Stop the Wall," "Don't turn Bethlehem into a Ghetto" and "The Holy Land
Doesn't Need Walls, but Bridges." Alongside hung a huge portrait of Palestinian
leader Yasser Arafat.

About 50 Palestinians added to the somber atmosphere in Manger Square with a
sit-down protest to demand the return of their relatives Israel expelled in May
2002, as part of a deal to end the IDF siege on Church of the Nativity.

The IDF believes a few thousand tourists will visit Bethlehem in the next few
days. A senior officer told Haaretz foreign tourists and Christians from Israel
and the West Bank will be allowed in, and that both sides have an interest in
keeping order during the festivities.

He said the PA was preserving public order and preventing shooting toward
Israeli territory. Israeli and Palestinian officers meet in Bethlehem weekly to
coordinate protection for the tourists who come for Christmas.
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