Driving Christians out of Jerusalem

Church of the Holy Sepulchre

JVL Introduction

We repost a few related articles below.

First, Nir Hasson’s account of the hounding of Christians in Jerusalem in recent years by radical settlers determined to Judaise the City.

Second, a warning published in the Sunday Times by Justin Welby, Archbishop of Canterbury and Hosam Naoum, Anglican Archbishop in Jerusalem.

Third, a Statement on the Current Threat to Christian Presence in the Holy Land” by the Patriarchs and Heads of Churches in Jerusalem.

Finally, a mean-spirited response by Marie van der Zyl, President of the Board of Deputies, to Welby & Naoum’s article, taking offence at its reference to the story of the first Christmas which “foregrounds a refugee family, against the backdrop of a genocide of infants.”

Heaven forfend that the Christmas story should have any contemporary relevance!


In a campaign launched ahead of Christmas, leaders of Christian denominations in the city criticize Israel for its response to violent attacks and moves by settler groups to acquire more properties in the Old City

Haaretz, Nir Hasson

The heads of Christian denominations in Jerusalem have launched a campaign protesting violence by radical groups and attempts by Israeli settler organizations to acquire properties in the Old City, decrying a “systematic attempt to drive the Christian community out of Jerusalem and other parts of the Holy Land.”

The campaign launched last week, ahead of Christmas, joins other joint operations by Jerusalem churches against Israel’s policy in the Old City.

The campaign includes a new dedicated website, petitions and articles in international media. The church leaders highlight “incidents of physical and verbal assaults against priests and other clergy,” and the inability of the police to provide adequate protection.

They also decry attempts by “radical groups [to] continue to acquire strategic property in the Christian Quarter,” which is interpreted as being aimed at the Ateret Cohanim nonprofit’s attempts to enter two large buildings it bought from the Greek Orthodox Patriarchate in the Christian Quarter.

In a response to the campaign by the Council of Patriarchs and the heads several churches, the Israeli Foreign Ministry said their accusations were “baseless and distort the reality of the Christian community in Israel.”

1/6 Response to statement by Church leaders in Jerusalem:

The accusations that appear in the statement by Church leaders are baseless, and distort the reality of the Christian community in Israel. pic.twitter.com/68C2VzQnAu

— Lior Haiat 🇮🇱 (@LiorHaiat) December 20, 2021

“Religious leaders have a critical role to play in education for tolerance and coexistence, and church leaders should be expected to understand their responsibility and the consequences of what they have published, which could lead to violence and bring harm to innocent people,” the Foreign Ministry said.

The Greek Orthodox Patriarch of Jerusalem, Theophilos III, who was behind the campaign, said that “at no time in human history has the future of our Christian communities been shakier,” adding that “radical groups are intent on uprooting us from our homes, businesses and ritual sites. Instead of being divided, we must unite on behalf of a peaceful and tolerant Holy Land for all religions.”

The joint statement was signed by the heads of all the large churches in the city, including the Armenian Apostolic Orthodox Patriarch of Jerusalem, the Latin Patriarch of Jerusalem, the Custody of the Holy Land representing the Vatican, and the head of the Anglican Church.

“Throughout the Holy Land, Christians have become the target of frequent and sustained attacks by fringe radical groups,” says their statement. “Since 2012 there have been countless incidents of physical and verbal assaults against priests and other clergy, attacks on Christian churches, with holy sites regularly vandalized and desecrated, and ongoing intimidation of local Christians who simply seek to worship freely and go about their daily lives.”

They say the number of violent incidents toward Christian clergy, mostly on the part of young Jews, has increased recently. One of the churches that suffers the most from this problem in the Armenian Church, which is located near the Jewish Quarter of the Old City.

“I’ve been in Israel since 1995 and never before have there been so many incidents like this,” said Father Koryoun Baghdasaryan, the chancellor of the Armenian Patriarchate of Jerusalem. “Every day that I leave my home for the Church of the Holy Sepulcher or to visit family, I’m afraid something will happen to me. There were always curses and spitting, in recent years physical violence also started.”

Church leaders also say that the government’s decision to restrict incoming tourism over the omicron variant has hurt Christian pilgrimage to the city for Christmas. The coronavirus restrictions also affect the passage of Palestinian believers from the West Bank to Jerusalem. The decision by Interior Minister Ayelet Shaked last week to allow the entry of Birthright groups into Israel in spite of the closing of the skies has also led to great anger among the church leadership, who claim it is discriminatory.

The fact that Christian pilgrims will not visit Jerusalem this year to celebrate Christmas significantly harms the churches financially, said sources involved in the matter. One of the considerations for launching the campaign was the desire to raise donations from the Christian world.

This distress comes in addition to the threat to evacuate two large buildings in the Christian Quarter, the Imperial Hotel and Petra Hotel. Recently, after a long legal battle, the hotels were transferred to the ownership of a Jewish organization that had bought the buildings, and which is now trying to evict the Palestinians who are running the hotels – and bring in Jewish families to live there. The heads of the Christian communities now fear that the change in ownership of the hotels – which were bought in a controversial deal by Ateret Cohanim 15 years ago using shell companies – could change the character of the Christian Quarter.

The release of the statement last week drew attention from a number of newspapers around the world, including the British Telegraph, Sunday Times and Times. The headline of an article written jointly in The Times by Justin Welby, the Archbishop of Canterbury, and Hosam Naoum, the archbishop of the Episcopal Church of Jerusalem and the Middle East – the Anglican Church – read: “Let us pray for the Christians being driven from the Holy Land.“

In a different article published in The Telegraph and written by Francesco Patton, the Custody of the Holy Land on behalf of the Vatican, he wrote: “In recent years, the lives of many Christians have been made unbearable by radical local groups with extremist ideologies. It seems that their aim is to free the Old City of Jerusalem from its Christian presence, even the Christian quarter.”

The statement was unusual not just for its content, but also because of the cooperation between the different Christian denominations in Jerusalem. Throughout history, the relations between the different churches has mostly been one of hostility and disputes, sometimes even violent ones.

This cooperation seems similar to that of 2018 when most of the Christian leadership in Jerusalem joined together to protest the law concerning church-owned lands and the dispute with Jerusalem city hall over the collection of local property taxes from certain church-owned institutions. In what was an unusual step in protest at the time, the church leaders closed the Church of the Holy Sepulcher.


Archbishops warn of ‘concerted effort’ to drive Christians from Holy Land

Sunday Times, 19 December 2021

Writing in the Sunday Times, the Archbishop of Canterbury and the Anglican Archbishop in Jerusalem warn of a concerted attempt by fringe, radical groups to drive Christians away from the Holy Land – which takes place against the ‘historic tragedy’ of the Christian population’s century-long decline. 

Church of the Holy Sepulchre

Christmas is a time when we think about the land of the Bible. We hear readings and sing carols that name Jerusalem, Nazareth and Bethlehem. These are places that are familiar to billions of Christians, whether they have visited them or not. But we should not romanticise them – and especially not this Christmas.

Last week, leaders of churches in Jerusalem raised an unprecedented and urgent alarm call. In a joint statement, they said Christians throughout the Holy Land have become the target of frequent and sustained attacks by fringe radical groups.

In a joint statement they described “countless incidents” of physical and verbal assaults against priests and other clergy, and attacks on Christian churches. They spoke of holy sites regularly vandalized and desecrated, and ongoing intimidation of local Christians as they go about their worship and daily lives.

The Romanian Orthodox monastery in Jerusalem was vandalized during Lent in March this year, the fourth attack on that holy place in a single month. During Advent last December, someone lit a fire in the Church of All Nations in the Garden of Gethsamene, the place where Jesus prayed the night before he was crucified. Usually a place of pilgrimage for Christians from around the world, it’s thought the vandal took advantage of the lack of visitors due to the pandemic.

These tactics are being used by such radical groups “in a systematic attempt to drive the Christian community out of Jerusalem and other parts of the Holy Land”, the Jerusalem church leaders said in their statement.

It is for this reason that when you speak with Palestinian Christians in Jerusalem today you will often hear this cry: “In fifteen years’ time, there’ll be none of us left!”

This crisis takes place against a century-long decline in the Christian population in the Holy Land. In 1922, at the end of the Ottoman Era, Christians in the Holy Land were estimated to number 73,000; about 10% of the population. In 2019, Christians constituted less than 2% of the population of the Holy Land: a massive drop in just 100 years.

In Israel, there is some increase in the overall numbers of Christians. The imminent reopening of St Peter’s Anglican Church in Jaffa, which has been closed for over 70 years, is encouraging.

But in East Jerusalem, the central place for pilgrimage and the site of the Church of the Holy Sepulchre – where Christ is believed to have been crucified – there is steady decline. Church leaders believe that there are now fewer than 2,000 Christians left in the Old City of Jerusalem.

This is the land that 2.5 billion Christians worldwide recognise as the birthplace of the church. Yet Christians, who have been a continuous presence there for over 2,000 years, are too often obscured and even forgotten beneath the competing perceptions of the geopolitics of the Middle East. The Christian presence punches above the weight of its numbers.

A recent study by the University of Birmingham estimates that the tourism industry generated by the Christian heritage of the Holy Land brings over $3 billion into the region’s economy. The Palestinian Christian population is a highly educated population that contributes beyond its numbers to high-tech industries, hospitals and church-based schools. Christians are good news for the region!

Christians in Israel enjoy democratic and religious freedoms that are a beacon in the region. But the escalation of physical and verbal abuse of Christian clergy, and vandalism of holy sites by fringe, radical groups, are a concerted attempt to intimidate and drive them away.

Meanwhile the growth of settler communities, and travel restrictions brought about by the Separation Wall, have deepened the isolation of Christian villages and curtailed economic and social possibilities. All of these factors have contributed to a steady stream of Palestinian Christians leaving the Holy Land to seek lives and livelihoods elsewhere – a historic tragedy unfolding in real time.

It does not have to be this way. This trend can be reversed – but action must be taken fast. We encourage governments and authorities in the region to listen to church leaders in their midst: To engage in the practical conversations that will lead to vital Christian culture and heritage being guarded and sustained. The time for action is now!

Over the Advent period, it’s tempting to be seduced by cosy visions of the Christmas story – twinkling stars, exotic visitors, a painless birth of a baby who doesn’t cry. The reality would have been much different: this is a story of God’s embrace of humanity in all its messiness.

The first Christmas tells us of God coming into our world among ordinary lives of human struggle. It foregrounds a refugee family, against the backdrop of a genocide of infants. There’s not much about lullabies and cuddly farm animals.

So let’s get real this Christmas. When we sing “O Little Town of Bethlehem”, or “Once in Royal David’s City”, let’s hear the voice of the church of the Holy Land – and thank them for their gift to all of us. Let’s pray for their flourishing and their future: a future intertwined with the future prosperity and common good of all communities.

Woven through the first Christian story is a message of hope and of good news for all people – a small light that can never be put out. Whatever your religion or belief, may you know the peace and joy of the Christ-child this Christmas.

The Most Revd Justin Welby, Archbishop of Canterbury
The Most Revd Hosam Naoum, Anglican Archbishop in Jerusalem


Board of Deputies President response to the Archbishop of Canterbury’s article on the Holy Land

19 December 2021

His Excellency
The Most Reverend Justin Welby Archbishop of Canterbury

Your Grace,

It is with great regret that I, as President of the Board of Deputies of British Jews, feel the need to respond to your article in the Sunday Times about the situation in the Holy Land, having found certain passages deeply troubling.

I agree entirely that assaults on the Christian community in the Holy Land, carried out by extremists, are unacceptable. All people of faith have the right to freedom of worship and belief. If your article had focussed solely on the attacks that Christian clergy, communities and places of worship have tragically suffered, then this response would not have been necessary.

The article offers its own reasons for the decline of the Christian population in the Holy Land. I note that in the past century, both in Israel’s heartlands and the West Bank, the demographics show that the Palestinian population has increased significantly. If the overall Palestinian population has greatly increased, but the Palestinian Christian population has significantly declined, then clearly there are more complex reasons than those raised in the article, which appeared to attribute this decline to Jewish settlers and the barrier built to halt the wave of terror attacks of the Second Intifada.

I was especially troubled by your description of “the first Christmas”, which allows for the possibility of comparison to current events. In particular, I noted your reference to “the backdrop of a genocide of infants”, a clear reference to the narrative of the “Massacre of the Innocents”, as recounted in the Gospel of Matthew. I found this reference troubling because of the potential linkage which could be made between Christianity, Jews and the killing of children in any current context.

This is particularly distressing because I know that you have advocated for policies that support Jewish communal concerns. I fear that rather than encouraging reasoned dialogue on the issues you raise, this may in fact divide communities.

I would ask for a meeting with you to discuss our concerns and seek a way forward in which we can work together more closely in the pursuit of peace and harmony between Jewish and Christian communities – not just in the Holy Land, but in this country as well.

Yours sincerely,

Marie van der Zyl
President

Comments (2)

  • Dr Rodney Watts says:

    I very much appreciate this piece both as a Jewish Christian here in the UK, and also as someone who is aware of the discrimination in Israel against not only Palestinian Christians but also Jewish Christians, sometimes referred derogatively to as ‘smolani’ (radical leftists)

    At last Archbishop Justin has made an unequivocal statement that sets out a number of truths spanning the time and circumstances of the birth of Yeshua HaMashiach (Jesus the Messiah, as Christians believe) and today. Of course, it comes as no surprise to read the response of the bigoted defender of Israel, Marie van der Zyl, containing the usual twaddle. I just hope the Archbiushop does not give a millimeter, and takes the opportunity to emphasise the apartheid nature of Israel–just as the late truly great Archbishop Desmond Tutu would have.

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  • Stephen Richards says:

    The Israeli constitution now only acknowledges Judaism. No other religion can be tolerated & everyone else must be expelled &/or ethnically cleansed.

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