By A Web Design

Washington Report, January/February 2006, pages 16-19

Special Report

Bethlehem Voices: Hopes and Fears

By Michael Keating and Delinda Hanley

All Photos by M. Keating

AFTER Christians around the world sing “Oh Little Town of Bethlehem” and sit in crowded church pews to hear about the wondrous birth of Christ 2005 years ago, they should also talk about Jesus’ relatives living in Bethlehem today—and then plan a trip to meet them tomorrow. These days only a few pilgrims brave Israeli checkpoints to visit Jesus’ birthplace. Without tourists, Bethlehemites are hungry, exhausted and losing hope.

Washington Report on Middle East Affairs, November/December 1996, page 97

Middle East History—It Happened in December

Christians in Israel Suffer Prejudice From Jewish Bigots

By Donald Neff

It was 19 years ago, on Dec. 29, 1977, that Christians in Israel and the occupied territories protested a new law passed by the Israeli parliament making it illegal for missionaries to proselytize Jews. Protestant churches charged that the law had been “hastily pushed through parliament during the Christmas period when Christians were busily engaged in preparing for and celebrating their major festival.” The law made missionaries liable to five years’ imprisonment for attempting to persuade people to change their religion, and three years’ imprisonment for any Jew who converted. The United Christian Council complained that the law could be “misused in restricting religious freedom in Israel.”¹

Nonetheless, it came into force on April 1, 1978, prohibiting the offering of “material inducement” for a person to change his religion. A material inducement could be something as minor as the giving of a Bible.² Although the Likud government of Menachem Begin assured the Christian community that the law applied equally to all religions and did not specifically mention Christians, the United Christian Council of Israel charged that it was biased and aimed specifically at Christians since only Christians openly proselytized. Council representatives also cited anti-Christian speeches made in the parliament during debate on the law. Parliament member Binyamin Halevy had called missionaries “a cancer in the body of the nation.”³