“Christians have been fleeing the West Bank (where most Christians lived) in droves because of Jewish settler violence and shocking ill treatment from IDF and Israeli authorities.”
They are leaving because THEY ARE UNDER THE PALESTINIAN AUTHORITY and subject to abuse from MUSLIMS! Many of them move...TO ISRAEL!
Good grief. Bethlehem went from 80+% Christian down to 10%, and it wasn’t because JEWS were abusing them! There are no Jews in Bethlehem!
Facts aren’t high on things the Fuentes Acolytes care about.
They are leaving because of Jewish settlers (some of whom are violent), lack of security, restriction of movement, fears the war in Gaza will spread and economic hardship.
See:
“Since the 1967 war between Israel and neighbouring Arab countries, Israel has occupied the West Bank, which Palestinians want as the core of a future independent state.
Israel has built Jewish settlements, deemed illegal by most countries, across the territory. Israel disputes this, citing historical and biblical ties to the land. Several of its ministers live in settlements and favour their expansion. See:
“The West Bank has been transformed by the rapid growth of Jewish settlements over the past two years, with strident settlers pushing to impose Israeli sovereignty on the area.”
Also see:
But for the past two years, the doors of Christmas House have remained closed, Jack Issa Giacaman told Middle East Eye.
“You don’t see anybody around. Unfortunately during the last years Israel converted Bethlehem to be a big prison,” said Giacaman, who currently manages the family business.”
“Pressed up hard against the separation wall between Israel and the occupied West Bank, corralled on surrounding hills by settlements, and choked by a network of dozens of checkpoints and security gates, Bethlehem’s Christian and Palestinian identities exist under an ever-tightening siege.
Christians accounted for 85 percent of the population of Bethlehem governorate when Israel was created, but by 2017 that figure had collapsed to about 10 percent.
The Israeli assault on Bethlehem has accelerated at a blistering rate since February 2023, when Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu handed Finance Minister Bezalel Smotrich, head of the Jewish ultra-nationalist Religious Zionism party and a settler himself, authority over the West Bank.
More from the second link,but this time about The Shepherds’ Field instead of Bethlehem:
“Bulldozers arrived in Beit Sahour last month to prepare the ground, triggering panic and fear among local residents.
“There is a sense of terror. A big spirit of sorrow and grief. The wound is still open. We are actively losing our land. We cannot conceive the idea,” said Dalia Qumsieh, a human rights activist and local resident who spoke to MEE before Sunday’s announcement.
For anyone familiar with the Nativity story, Beit Sahour holds significance as the place where angels brought the news of Jesus’s birth to shepherds “keeping watch over their flock by night”.
But every Palestinian knows what the arrival of settlers portends.
The destruction of an ancient way of life. The building of new “Apartheid” roads that carve through the landscape and redraw the map. Farmers - and shepherds - driven off their land. The smashing of agricultural equipment. Settler pogroms and daily intimidation.”
The wonderful Baptist pastor in the video I posted in my #7 is from Beit Sahour. Why don’t you give the video a chance and hear what he has to say about what life is like for Christians in the West Bank?