Barrier threatens Bethlehem's future
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Date: 22/4/04
www.aljazeera.net With Israel's controversial separation barrier expanding south, Bethlehem is next
and the mayor says he fears for the future of the town.
The barrier will eventually ring Bethlehem on three sides and slice off about 2000 hectares of farmland, Mayor Hanna Nasir said. Maps provided by Israeli authorities confirmed his description.
"This wall will stop all kinds of natural growth," Nasir said, noting that 70% of the work force depend on tourism. "This is a serious blow to the future of Bethlehem."
Nawal Shuaibat, 45, a math teacher at an Arab school in Jerusalem, has no permit and takes a back road to work. "I don't sleep at night. I can't stop thinking about how I'm going to feed my kids once this path is closed off," said Shuaibat, a mother of four. Her husband, who used to carve olive wood souvenirs, is out of work because there are few tourists.
"I don't sleep at night. I can't stop thinking about how I'm going to feed my kids once this path is closed off"
On the north side of Bethlehem, nearest to Jerusalem, curious nuns from a nearby monastery took pictures as cranes lined up eight-meter-high cement slabs to form a wall already several hundred metres long.
"With this wall, there will be no freedom. There is a feeling of being in a prison," said Sylvia Melato, a Roman Catholic nun.
The barrier will come within two kilometres of the Church of the Nativity, built over a grotto where tradition says Jesus was born.
Ata Allah Hanna, spokesman for the Greek Orthodox Patriarchate in Jerusalem, said some of the land expropriated for the barrier belonged to his church. Israeli officials said they were in "advanced negotiations" to find a solution to the church's complaint.
Hanna said the barrier would complicate travel between the Church of the Nativity in Bethlehem and the Church of the Holy Sepulchre in Jerusalem - two of Christianity's holiest sites.
Israel's travel restrictions, imposed at the outbreak of the Intifida (uprising) in September 2000, have often affected tourists and pilgrims, with tour groups not allowed to enter Bethlehem during tense times.
Bethlehem's municipality appealed to Israel's Supreme Court against a 3km section of the wall that would branch off the main route and wrap around Rachel's Tomb.
Israel maintained control of an enclave around the Biblical matriarch's tomb after withdrawing from Bethlehem in 1995 under interim peace deals with the Palestinians.
Israel says it needs to control the enclave because the Palestinians have not kept promises to safeguard it. The Palestinians say Israel is simply grabbing a chunk of Bethlehem.
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