Muslims Continue to Push Chrisitians out of Bethlehem

Only 18 years ago the Chrisitian population of Bethlehem was 60% of the total, today it is 15%. Similar situations for Christians in Iraq, Egypt and most of the Middle East. The Middle East used to have a large Chrisitian population until persecution, murder and forced conversions left it decimated.Israel National News

The Muslim Fatah-controlled authority in Judea and Samaria is encouraging a "sharp demographic shift" in Bethlehem, where the Christian population went from a 60 percent majority in 1990 to a 40 percent minority in 2000, to about 15 percent of the city's total population today.

It is estimated that, for the past seven years, more than one thousand Christians have been emigrating from the Bethlehem area annually and that only 10,000 to 13,000 Christians remain in the city. International human rights lawyer Justus Reid Weiner, who teaches at Hebrew University, told the Jerusalem Institute for Global Jewish Affairs that, under the PA-Fatah regime, Christian Arabs have been victims of frequent human rights abuses by Muslims.

"There are many examples of intimidation, beatings, land theft, firebombing of churches and other Christian institutions, denial of employment, economic boycotts, torture, kidnapping, forced marriage, sexual harassment, and extortion," he said. PA officials are directly responsible for many of the attacks, and some Muslims who have converted to Christianity have been murdered.

Pastor booted
As people with "dhimmi" status, Christians living in Palestinian-controlled territories are not treated as the equals of Muslims. He says: "They are subjected to debilitating legal, political, cultural, and religious restrictions. This has becomea critical problem for the Palestinian Christians in the West Bank and Gaza. Muslim groups like Hamas and Islamic Jihad have built a culture of hatred upon the age-old foundations of Islamic society. Moreover, the PA has adopted Islamic law into its draft constitution."

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