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Broken Bethlehem. By Uncle Monty.
West Bank Photos By Alex Albion.
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At where our magnificent Christ child was born,
the Palestinian town of Bethlehem is a pretty depressing
site on the West Bank with its Isreali 30ft. high security walls
with gun towers and streets full of garbage and trash along
with niggardly Muslim taxi drivers pesting the Christain visitor
like me to take a taxi to the Church of the Nativity at where
Christ was actually born. On the day I arrived at Bethlehem,
fistfights and scuffles broke out again between rival Orthodox
Christian clergymen over the denominational cleaning
of the church in preparation for Christmas Services.
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Bethlehem Wall Message:
Israeli Solider Being Searched By A Palestinain Girl.
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The Israeli rationale against the Palestinians borders on a kind
of Fascism that feeds its pathological mindset to the point of no
return with its 30ft high security walls and gun towers and count-
less armed police and soldiers at every turm along with their
deadly and tigger happy AK-47s. It's all going to end in a final
and huge bloodbath which will devour and destroy all that
Israel should stands for.
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My Street View of Bethlehem.
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I've chosen primarily not to write about Bethlehem from a
religious point of view per se, but rather from an English
traveller's view of the city of Christ's birth.
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There was a listlessness about the place and a sense of
emptiness prevaled all around me as I walked the streets
of Broken Bethlehem to try to find its social pulse and its
lifeblood and historic character and the living essence
of the local people. It was deadpan to me.
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The more I walked thru Bethlehem, the more I felt depressed
at what I saw or rather what I had expected to see of such
an important place in the origins or birth of Christianity.
It was awful to me.
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I had expected to see joy and I did not. I had expected to
see Christ's face everywhere, but I did not. I had expected
to see signs of the cross here and there, but I did not aside
from the churches. And, I had expected to see a happy
Bethlehem, but I did not.
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All I saw were cars being stopped on the streets by
overzealous Palestinian police. All I saw were people who
seemed resigned to the oppression and injustice of the
Jewish State of Israel over them. All I saw were growing
Islamic mosques against the old churches of old at ancient
Bethlehem. And all I saw made me realise that Bethlehem
is broken as a free human community that has been shafted
like so much of Palestine thesedays under Israel's bare
ironfist of Jewish state police and singular Hebrew
military. It pitiful, really!
*More Israeli Government Built Barricades
Against A Free Palestine and Her People.
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Bethlehem Street Scape.
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PLO & Political Bethlehem: Arafat & Abbas.
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Politically, all I found were banners and posters of the
Palestinian Liberation Organization (PLO) and the
Palestinian National Authority (PNA). Such appears to
be dominated by Muslims rather than Christians, who are
a growing minortiy inside Palestine and. of course, inside
the whole of Israel.
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Only one person was willing to talk to me about Palestinian
politics. He reserved his most critical comments about the
British, who he blamed for giving away to the Jews their home-
land of Palestine and thus robbing the Palestinans of their rightful
place and statehood.. He cusred the British for what they did
leading upto the creation of the illegimate State of Israel in
1948. When I asked him what he thought of Tony Blair as the
Peace Envoy between Israel and Palestine, he could hardly
contain his hatred and comtempt against despised Blair as
he then spit on the street when I mentioned his vile name.
"He's a paid mouthpiece of the Zionists," he declared
at almost choking on his own words against double-
dealing and deceitful-wheeling Tony Blair.
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Asked what he thought about the creation of a Palestinian
State, he said it was too late to be peacefully-created
without further bloodshed and violent reaction against
Israeli present oppressive policies under Israeli PM
Benjamin Netanyahu "fascist" Likud Party.
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The Christian gentleman gave little hope of a peaceful
settlement of the Palestinian Question. "We shall rise again,
mark my words, against the tryants of Israel," he remarked
with his barely concealed anger. British-educated he was and
was in his early 70's and was imprisoned and tortured by
the Israelis he told me. I have no way, of course, of
confirming the truth of what he said. Although, I have
no reason not to believe him.
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The Holy See's Pope Paul VI Mission At Bethlehem.
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Early Evening Outside Bethlehem's Major New Mosque.
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Disabled Muslim Street Peddler Across From Mosque.
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Residential Bethlehem
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Football Academy For Football Crazy
Youthz of Palestine! Good For Them ...
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One of the few remaining British-built
Edifices At Broken Bethlehem.
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Xmas & New Year At Broken Bethlehem.
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Overall, my visit to Broken Bethlehem was a sore
eye-opener and the complete antithesis of a free and
open society. I am glad I wasn't born a Christian in
Bethlehem or have to live under the foul yoke of today's
Israeli Police State or the equally brutal Palestinian police.
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My memory of Broken Bethlehem will not be mended
soon, although I am certainly pleased to have visited much
of Palestine and, of course, Bethlehem, too. Oddly
enough, my Christain faith as an English Anglican has
only been strengthened and not weakened by what I
saw at Bethlehem, at Jericho, at Ramallah, and at
Hebron, and that all four of them stand inside Palestine
of past centuries untold. Broken Bethlehem doesn't
deserve its present-day fate and condition in the
Name of the Good Lord and Our Saviour
Christ Jesus. Amen.
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Truthfully, Uncle Monty.
+King Charles The Martyr, 2012.
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My Mistake!!!
I made a mistake earlier in stating my need to attend
a cardiology appointment today, when such wasn't
due after all for today, but rather for tomorrow. So
there was no need for me to come back later today to
complete this latest story of mine of "Broken Bethlehem."
Nor did I need to rush off now to a cardiology appointment
with my good British cardiologist. I shall also undergo
Phlebotomy (NOT Lobotomy) tests under his care.
In the meantime, I did leave you with some images of
Bethlehem that are not intended to be of the tourist kind,
but rather of the 21st century depresssing city of
Christ's birth. It isn't very pretty or very religious as a
Palestinian city for the average and informal Christian
pilgrim like me, except at the churches now surround-
ed more by hostile Islam than healthy Christianity.
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Feedback & Comments
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Jerusalem Far From Golden
For the Homeless.
By Uncle Monty.
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