Posted on 04/04/2002 11:23:16 PM PST by eagleninja
BETHLEHEM, West Bank (Reuters) - For three decades, Samir Ibrahim Salman rose every day at dawn to ring the bells of the Church of the Nativity, one of Christianity's holiest sites, in Bethlehem.
Thursday, the church bells did not toll.
At 6:30 a.m., the middle-aged Christian Palestinian left home for the short walk across Manger Square to the church, where Israeli troops were besieging about 200 Palestinians, some of them armed, who took refuge there Tuesday.
Moments later he was shot in the chest.
"As soon as he left his house, a sniper shot him," Anton Salman, a distant cousin of the bell-ringer, told Reuters by telephone from the West Bank town.
Palestinians are convinced an Israeli fired the fatal bullet. The Israeli army said troops had fired no shots near the church. It had no knowledge of Salman's fate.
"He had been used to ringing the church bells at dawn every day since 1967," Anton Salman said. "Almost everyone in Bethlehem knows him."
Medics said Salman bled for hours in the square before an ambulance was able to reach him. By then he was dead.
Anton Salman said his cousin was a familiar sight to many Bethlehem residents accustomed to seeing him make his way, back slightly bent, across the square to the ancient church, built above the site where Christians believe Jesus was born.
"Apparently he was unaware of the danger. He was a simple man who spent most of his time in the church. He never bothered anybody or hurt anyone," he added.
Israeli troops occupied Bethlehem along with other Palestinian-ruled West Bank cities and towns in a military offensive which Israel said was aimed at hunting down suicide bombers who have killed dozens of Israelis.
Hospital staff say at least 13 Palestinians have been killed since tanks and armored troop carriers swept into the town Monday, the day after Easter.
A handful of Palestinian fighters skirmished with the Israelis, but most have now melted away except, possibly, for some gunmen who took refuge in the Church of the Nativity, mingling with dozens of nuns, priests and civilians.
Israel says some of the gunmen are militants suspected of carrying out attacks against the Jewish state.
"It's a shame. Samir won't be able to wake up Bethlehem on his church bells any more," Anton Salman said.
In Bethlehem, the Israelis fired on the Santa Maria church run by a Catholic Salesian order and a neighbouring Maronite church after they refused to open their doors. The Catholic priest was killed and six of the nuns were wounded.
Vatican officials identified the priest as Father Jacques Amateis, 62, a long-time resident of Jerusalem and noted expert on Arabic literature. He came from Italy in his late teens and spent time in Lebanon where he was injured during clashes, according to Father Antonio, head of the Salesian school in Beit Jamal, west of Jerusalem.
Hospital officials said that his body languished in the church after he was shot because ambulances were prevented by Israeli forces from reaching the scene.
Only problem with this story is that none of it was true. And it came from a priest.
So your solution to the violence in the Middle-East is to make every building into an "off-limits" official church sanctuary?!All I am saying that holy places already are sanctuary, according to popular culture much older than you and me put together.
And all that I am doing is pointing out that there is no such thing as sanctuary. If there was such a thing, then all one would have to do is have every building and street turned into open churches....
made up stories and lending lies to propaganda talking points... does NOT a documentary factoid make.
then all one would have to do is have every building and street turned into open churches....Go ahead, then, and show us how that would be done... Why this nonsence? Just go ask your pastor, and I'm sure you'll get the skinny of it.
And all that I am doing is pointing out that there is no such thing as sanctuary.
_________________________
My tax dollars pay for your welfare checks.
I love my country. I've never quite understood the thought of leaving it just because all hell's breaking loose. Why wouldn't I rather just as soon be here as anywhere else.
But indeed it's we who now are unleashing, funding and strategizing to sustain by proxy a maelstrom of evil like the World Revolution has never seen before.
As the stakes rise, it will become impossible to criticize this effort, even. For fear of ostracization, dissent will be shut out by the Desperate Faithful who still protect a president who nailed open the the most profitable window of "Excess" Human Non-Personhood and -- "Texan" and family man that he claims to be -- takes the time to laud the family values of some satanic-chic freak who pissed on the Alamo. Just as they have no problems with the genocide of Arab subhuman dogs and radical "religious" fanatics, it's doubtful they'll have a problem with our government's getting aWaco with murder of its own for the sake of Security and Prosperity and "getting tough" on crime.
More and more, it's possible the better part is to rip free from Uncle Sam's leeching and go stand tall with the truly brave on some bridge in Serbia ... waiting for Clean Hands from the Sky to target the bullseye shielding a broken heart.
SHOW ME THE MONEY.
You need it for your medication.
Maybe because it is a place of sanctuary. I guess you don't believe in such things.
*Whomever* did this, it was a terrible act. If the Israelis did it, they deserve to be condemned just as vigorously as if the Palestinians did it.
Tuor
They shot their way in and took hostages... I don't believe in doing that to a church. Now they're effectively holding the church itself hostage, if Israel makes a move, they'll destroy it.
Dick.
Quasimodo. Feel stupid yet?
INTROIT ¤ I. Peter 2. 2
Quasimodo geniti infantes, alleluia: rationabiles, sine dolo lac concupiscite, alleluia, alleluia, alleluia. -- (Ps. 80. 2) Exsultate Deo adjutori nostro: jubilate Deo Jacob. V.: Gloria Patri . . . Quasimodo geniti infantes, alleluia: rationabiles, sine dolo lac concupiscite, alleluia, alleluia, alleluia.
As newborn babes, alleluia, desire the rational milk without guile, alleluia, alleluia, alleluia. -- (Ps. 80. 2). Rejoice to God our Helper; sing aloud to the God of Jacob. V.: Glory to the Father . . . -- As newborn babes . . .
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