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Posted on 04/04/2002 3:00:34 PM PST by RCW2001
Church caretaker and bell ringer shot and killed during Bethlehem standoff
Thu Apr 4, 2:21 PM ET
By IBRAHIM HAZBOUN, Associated Press Writer
BETHLEHEM, West Bank - Bethlehem's residents always knew by the tolling bells at the Church of the Nativity when a mass was under way, when a couple was getting married, when someone died and was to be buried. Samir Ibrahim Salman, who rang the bells, had a different chime for each one.
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Inside the basilica, built above the spot revered as Jesus' birth grotto, 240 armed Palestinians have been holed up since Tuesday, with Israeli troops closing in and calling on the gunmen to surrender and come out. No one has done so.
At dawn Thursday, Salman set out for the church, gunfire or no gunfire. He did so every day for most of his life.
He was well-known by the Palestinian Christian community, which makes up about half of the city's population of about 30,000 people.
You could see him there wiping the drips of candle wax from the old marble and stone or helping the Greek Orthodox priests with their services. But he was best known for his ringing. Each day he'd climb the steps up to the bell tower in the fourth-century, fortress-like stone and wood church.
He was a poor man. He lived alone. He never married. Both of his parents passed away.
"He was a simple guy. He never harmed any person," said a relative, Anton Salman, who spoke by telephone from inside the besieged church. "He never spoke to anyone, but if you asked for help, he would run to do it for you."
He was only interested in taking care of the church, the relative said. And so he hoped to do the same, even as the church became the center of a standoff. He was shot in the chest and died, his body slumping into a street just a few steps from the church.
It was not clear who fired the shots.
At the Church of the Nativity, the standoff continued.
Gunmen and others inside the church said Israeli troops blew open a back door leading into a small courtyard next to the ancient stone shrine and fired inside, wounding three people. The Israeli military denied the claim, saying soldiers did not make a move on the shrine.
Mazen Hassan, a Palestinian policeman in the church, said he and other armed men were close to the metal door when it was blown open and shots were fired injuring the people. An Associated Press reporter speaking to Hassan by phone could hear the sound of heavy shooting in the background. Hassan said Palestinians were not returning fire.
However, Lt. Col. Olivier Rafowicz, an Israeli army spokesman, denied soldiers moved into the church compound. Other military officials said there was shooting in nearby Manger Square, and that troops were pursuing gunmen.
The Israeli military prevented reporters from reaching the church to independently assess the rival claims.
Rafowicz said Israel has been offering safe passage out of the church for anyone wishing it, and that Palestinian officials holed up inside "are preventing the people from leaving."
The standoff at the church began Tuesday, when the fighters, who had been engaged in heavy gunbattles with advancing Israeli troops for hours, dashed a few dangerous steps from the Palace Hotel to the Church of the Nativity.
An army video released Thursday showed the gunmen running a dozen at a time from the nearby hotel, their heavy footfalls splashing puddles in the cobblestone path under a slashing rain. "One at a time," shouted one of the men. Wearing military vests and boots and carrying rifles, they ran as another turned and provided cover, wildly firing an assault rifle.
Inside the dark, cold church nuns and priests, among about 60 members of the clergy there, have attended to 10 wounded gunmen and tried to come up with blankets. Two of the wounded need immediate medical care, said Father Ibrahim Faltas.
The bells rang out Thursday afternoon. This time though it wasn't Salman tugging at their ropes.
jak-kl
Are they kidding? Anybody trying to leave would be shot...in the back by the Palis. This guy was also probably shot by them to make the Jews like bad. Remember, the Muslims hate the Christians as much as they hate the Jews, and this man was a Palastinin Christian. That makes him a traitor to Muslim.
Oh yeah? Well, let me take a guess!
He must not have been right in the head.
Not making fun of him, just seems so stupid to go there under that situation.
Generally true but the Jews and Turkish Muslims have a strange love affair going back to the time the Turks conquered Christian Byzantium. The Turk allowed Jews from Spain to settle in the newly acquired Ottoman Turkish imperial lands often allowing Jews to take over formerly Christian homes and land. For example, there are letters from Jews to the Turkish pasha asking for Christian slaves to be sent to him to work in his operation in N. Africa.
Don't get me wrong - the "love" affair that some Arab Christians have with their Muslim cousins is just as strange...maybe some psychiatrist can explain that.
Remember their Koran, convert them and if you can't kill them. (Paraphrased)
Anyone who claims to know is simply pushing their agenda. Is that what are doing, my friend?
I don't have a map of the area, but I think that Israeli soldiers could have seen what direction he was running. If they felt he was a threat, he would not have made it almost to the church.
The people inside the church may not have been able to see him until he was almost upon them. Not that I think that Palis are on a hair trigger.
Oh, I forgot. The Palis said they were out of food and Ammo. That means it couldn't have been a Pali. Must have been those blood thirsty, fully armed priests.
Guess the Israelis could just walk on in and ask them to surrender.
"I'm sorry, but if I knew there was a gun battle between the army and a band of terrorists going on at my job, or my church, I'd be staying home for the duration.
Somebody should have talked some sense into him.
Could this Christian Palestinian have possibly been shot and killed by a Israeli Jew? Is that possible?
What disturbs me most about the forever-ongoing Israel/arab conflict is that fact that most Americans rush to "take sides". Many here were recenly very dissapointed to see Switzerland join the UN because we admired their neutrality towards international events. We often quote Thomas Jefferson and other Founders here, but we seem to have forgotten their warnings concerning our involvement in "foreign entanglements". Don't get me wrong - the arabs are scum. They are not our friends. But what has Israel done for us? Didn't Aristotle say, "The enemy of my enemy is not necessarily my friend"?
Would the United States somehow become weaker or less of a country if we decided to just step back and let these two groups just slug it out over their rocks and sand? Or would we be better off? I tend to believe the latter.
Someone, please enlighten me.
Eternal Memory to my Orthodox brother.
Could this Christian Palestinian have possibly been shot and killed by a Israeli Jew? Is that possible?Never! Not when there's all that ARAB SCUM running around to take up the slack in the INHUMANE and PREJUDICE department. /sarcasm
Since the Palistinians have been holed up in the church for three days, the caretaker managed to go back and forth unharmed the other two days? I mean, he never missed a day for most of his life, according to the author, Ibrahim Hazboun as he quotes one of the caretaker's relatives who spoke to him by telephone, HOLED UP INSIDE THE CHURCH.
Mr. Ibrahim Hazboun, writer for the AP, why didn't you mention the caretaker's last two days? Why didn't you tell us about conditions inside the church since you had a direct phone call with someone inside that church?
So many questions, so few answers. Why?
Most?
All is closer to the number.
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