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Mideast:
Christian-free zone?
By Joseph Farah
December
30, 2003
http://worldnetdaily.com/news/article.asp?ARTICLE_ID=36367
You saw the images on
television this Christmas season of Israeli soldiers patrolling Bethlehem.
You heard the Jews blamed for the unrest in the city of David, the
birthplace of Jesus. This column is about what you didn't see or hear in
those reports, something of an annual journalistic ritual.
The Christian population
of the Palestinian Authority, once representing 20 percent of the region,
is down to 2.4 percent. There are fewer than 50,000 Christian Arabs living
within the Palestinian Authority.
In 1948, Bethlehem was 80
percent Christian. Today it is 80 percent Muslim.
Where do they go?
Are you ready for a
shock?
Many of them prefer life
in Israel to life under the rule of Yasser Arafat and his friends in Hamas
and Islamic Jihad. In fact, life would be better just about anywhere else,
and those who have the ability to leave have left.
This massive display of
ethnic cleansing and population movement has been totally obscured by the
Palestinian Authority and covered up by the international media. Worse
yet, it has even been blamed on Israel.
But Christians fleeing
the Holy Land know why they are leaving. All one needs to do is ask them.
It began a long time ago. I know, because my grandparents fled for the
safety, security and freedom of America. Christians in the Middle East
know very well who their enemy is. They know why are they are oppressed.
They know who is attacking them. They know who is occupying them.
And it's not Israel.
Here are the facts. Some
2 million Christians have fled the Middle East in the past 20 years. Some
estimates are much higher than this. Since Arafat took over administration
of the Palestinian territories from Israel, the Christian population has
dropped from 15 percent to 2 percent.
They are being driven
out. They are being murdered. They are being raped. They are being
systematically persecuted. They are being harassed. They are being
intimidated.
Such is life for
Christians now in Bethlehem and other formerly Christian towns in the West
Bank. Just imagine what it will be like when Palestine becomes a real
state.
If these people were
fleeing Israeli oppression, why did they leave after the Israelis left? It
makes no sense. The only way Israel has fed the exodus of Christians from
the Middle East is by withdrawing from territories in Judea, Samaria,
Gaza, southern Lebanon and elsewhere. When Israel administered those
areas, Christian Arabs lived in safety and security.
The truth is the
Christian population in Israel has more than quadrupled since 1948. Why?
Israel guarantees religious freedom ñ whereas the Palestinian Authority
offers an official religion of Islam.
What has happened in the
Palestinian Authority is that the protective hand of Israel has been
lifted as it has - under international pressure - given Arafat and the
Palestinian Authority more and more autonomy to run its own territory.
Question: What's worse
than being bullied, harassed, intimidated and persecuted for your faith?
Answer: Being bullied,
harassed, intimidated and persecuted for your faith, and watching the
perpetrator of these crimes against humanity successfully blame someone
else for committing them.
It's time for the whole
world to recognize the mini-holocaust taking place against Christians in
the Middle East. It's time to punish those guilty of these atrocities,
specifically those in charge of the Palestinian Authority. For God's sake,
they must not be rewarded with a state of their own. |
