While Israel tries constantly to endear itself to Christian states, especially in Western Europe and North America. The Jewish state wastes no efforts to torment Christians in the Occupied Palestinian territories. Generally, The protracted and unrelenting persecution of Palestinians by Israel doesn’t distinguish between Muslims and Christians. Taking advantage of the general international atmosphere against Islamic extremists, such as al-Qaeda and ISIS, Israel has been spreading disinformation, claiming that the Christians’ emigration from Palestine is attributed first and foremost to “Muslim persecution” and harassment of Christians.
However, the plain truth is that Israel, not the Christians’ fellow Muslim compatriots, is responsible for emigration and the unmitigated suffering inflicted on all Palestinians, Christians and Muslims alike reflecting the unprecedented rate of emigration from Palestine.
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Indeed, Zionism has always been hostile to all non-Jews in Palestine, irrespective of their religious affiliation. This is evident from the recent resolution passed in the Israeli parliament, the Knesset, which defined Israel as an exclusively Jewish state whereby non-Jews, including tens of thousands of Christians, are treated as secondary citizens at best.
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In fact, Jewish hostility to Christians is as old as Christianity itself.
According to the Talmud, whenever a Jew utters Jesus’ name, he should say “may his name be damned, and memory erased”.
A few years ago, I couldn’t believe my ears when a respectable rabbi I was chatting with about religion, referred to Jesus as “the Hitler of Bethlehem.”
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Israeli persecution of Christians in Palestine assumes many expressions, including restrictions on movement, land confiscation, real-estate seizure as well as throttling Christian communities and predominantly Christian areas with ever-expanding Jewish colonies as in Bethlehem, Beit Sahur and Beit Jala.
The separation wall, the ugly barrier Israel has built in the West Bank for the purpose of annexing more Palestinian land, cuts through these communities, cutting off relatives and neighbors from each other.
Indeed, thanks to this Satanic structure, a neighbor, in order to visit his or her neighbor to wish him a merry Christmas, must now travel several kilometers, that is in case the Israelis would allow people to access the other side of the wall.
Several decades ago, Christians in the West Bank and East Jerusalem used to make up more than 6% of the total population. Today, according to a study published by two Christian Palestinian scholars, Afif Safeyyeh and Bernard Sabilla, Christian population in the occupied territories, including East Jerusalem, has dwindled to half a percent of the total population. This is horrifying and shocking, to say the least.
It is widely believed that Christians’ emigration from Palestine is especially high within the young male-population group whose ages range from 22 to 40.
Christians’ emigration from Palestine is much higher than Palestinian Muslims. A high-ranking clergyman from Bethlehem told this writer a few years ago that for every 100 Christian girls in the age of marriage (18-35), there are only 75 males.
“The overall situation in this regard is really bleak and we don’t know what to do to overcome this problem.”
This is not to say though that emigration from Palestine is confined to Palestinian Christians. Muslims, too, emigrate in increasingly large rates. However, due to the much larger Muslim population, emigration among Muslims is not conspicuous. Christians’ emigration from Palestine is much higher than Palestinian Muslims. More to the point, it is always more difficult for Muslim emigrants to establish themselves in their host countries for a variety of reasons including poverty and lack of knowledge of the language or languages of the adopted non-Arab country, which in many cases causes emigrants or would-be emigrants to reconsider their decisions and return home.
Christians in Palestine are only a numerical minority due to emigration. Otherwise, they are an integral part of the Palestinian community. Christian figures have always loomed large in the Palestinian struggle against the Israeli occupation.
Some of the more well- known figures include Palestinian spokeswoman Hanan Ashrawi, the late leader of the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestinian (PFLP) George Habash, and archimandrite Theodosios (Hanna Attallah) of the Orthodox Patriarchate of Jerusalem.
It is sad that in the absence of any prospects for ending the decades-old Israeli occupation, the plight of Palestinians in general and Palestinian Christians in particular will continue to exacerbate.
We hope and pray for putting an end to the emigration of Palestinian Christians, the indigenous inhabitants of Palestine. We also recommend that these emigrants be treated as refugees and temporary expatriates whose ultimate return to their ancestral country must be a top national priority.
More to the point, this writer recommends that all Christian emigrants be granted Palestinian citizenship. This would prevent or minimize assimilation and serve as a constant reminder to these people that they are Palestinians and that Palestine is their homeland.
