BETHLEHEM: The normally bustling biblical birthplace of Jesus resembled a ghost town on Sunday, as Christmas Eve celebrations in Bethlehem were called off due to the Israel-Hamas war.
The festive lights and Christmas tree that normally decorate Manger Square were missing, as were the throngs of foreign tourists and jubilant youth marching bands that gather in the West Bank town each year to mark the holiday. Dozens of Palestinian security forces patrolled the empty square.
“This year, without the Christmas tree and without lights, there’s just darkness,” said Brother John Vinh, a Franciscan monk from Vietnam who has lived in Jerusalem for six years.
He said he always comes to Bethlehem to mark Christmas, but this year was especially sobering, as he gazed at a nativity scene in Manger Square with a baby Jesus wrapped in a white shroud, reminiscent of the thousands of children killed in the fighting in Gaza. Barbed wire surrounded the scene, the grey rubble reflecting none of the joyous lights and bursts of color that normally fill the square during the Christmas season.
The cancelation of Christmas festivities is a severe blow to the town’s economy. Tourism accounts for an estimated 70 percent of Bethlehem’s income — almost all of that during the Christmas season.
With many major airlines canceling flights to Israel, few foreigners are visiting. Local officials say over 70 hotels in Bethlehem have been forced to close, leaving thousands of people unemployed.
Gift shops were slow to open on Christmas Eve, although a few did once the rain had stopped pouring down. There were few visitors, however.
“We can’t justify putting out a tree and celebrating as normal, when some people (in Gaza) don’t even have houses to go to,” said Ala’a Salameh, one of the owners of Afteem Restaurant, a family-owned falafel restaurant just steps from the square.
Salameh said Christmas Eve is usually the busiest day of the year. “Normally, you can’t find a single chair to sit, we’re full from morning till midnight,” said Salameh. This year, just one table was taken, by journalists taking a break from the rain.
Under a banner that read “Bethlehem’s Christmas bells ring for a cease-fire in Gaza,” a few teenagers offered small inflatable Santas, but no one was buying. Instead of their traditional musical march through the streets of Bethlehem, young scouts stood silently with flags. A group of local students unfurled a massive Palestinian flag as they stood in silence.
“Our message every year on Christmas is one of peace and love, but this year it’s a message of sadness, grief and anger in front of the international community with what is happening and going on in the Gaza Strip,” Bethlehem’s mayor, Hana Haniyeh, said in an address to the crowd.
Dr. Joseph Mugasa, a pediatrician, was one of the few international visitors. He said his tour group of 15 people from Tanzania was “determined” to come to the region despite the situation.
“I’ve been here several times, and it’s quite a unique Christmas, as usually there’s a lot of people and a lot of celebrations,” he said. “But you can’t celebrate while people are suffering, so we are sad for them and praying for peace.”
More than 20,000 Palestinians have been killed and more than 50,000 wounded during Israel’s air and ground offensive against Gaza’s Hamas rulers, according to health officials there, while some 85 percent of the territory’s 2.3 million residents have been displaced. The war was triggered by Hamas’ deadly assault Oct. 7 on southern Israel in which militants killed about 1,200 people, most of them civilians, and took more than 240 hostages.
The Gaza war has been accompanied by a surge in violence, with some 300 Palestinians killed by Israeli fire.
The fighting has affected life across the West Bank. Since Oct. 7, access to Bethlehem and other Palestinian towns in the Israeli-occupied territory has been difficult, with long lines of motorists waiting to pass military checkpoints. The restrictions have also prevented tens of thousands of Palestinians from exiting the territory to work in Israel.
Amir Michael Giacaman opened his store, “Il Bambino,” which sells olive wood carvings and other souvenirs, for the first time since Oct. 7. There have been no tourists, and few local residents have money to spare because those who worked in Israel have been stuck at home.
“When people have extra money, they go buy food,” said his wife, Safa Giacaman. “This year, we’re telling the Christmas story. We’re celebrating Jesus, not the tree, not Santa Claus, she said, as their daughter Makaella ran around the deserted store.
The fighting in Gaza was on the minds of the small Christian community in Syria, which is coping with a civil war now in its 13th year. Christians said they were trying to find joy, despite the ongoing strife in their homeland and in Gaza.
“Where is the love? What have we done with love?” said the Rev. Elias Zahlawi, a priest in Yabroud, a city about 80 kilometers (50 miles) north of Damascus. “We’ve thrown God outside the realm of humanity and unfortunately, the church has remained silent in the face of this painful reality.”
Some tried to find inspiration in the spirit of Christmas.
Latin Patriarch Pierbattista Pizzaballa, arriving from Jerusalem for the traditional procession to the Church of the Nativity, told the sparse crowd that Christmas was a “reason to hope” despite the war and violence.
The pared-down Christmas was in keeping with the original message of the holiday and illustrated the many ways the community is coming together, said Stephanie Saldana, who is originally from San Antonio, Texas, and has lived in Jerusalem and Bethlehem for the past 15 years with her husband, a parish priest at the St. Joseph Syriac Catholic Church.
“We feel Christmas as more real than ever, because we’re waiting for the prince of peace to come. We are waiting for a miracle to stop this war,” Saldana said.
On Christmas Eve, Bethlehem resembles ghost town as celebrations are halted due to war
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On Christmas Eve, Bethlehem resembles ghost town as celebrations are halted due to war
- Normally bustling biblical birthplace of Jesus looks like a ghost town on Christmas Eve
- Officials decided to forgo celebrations due to the Israel-Hamas war
PKK disarmament to take a few months in Iraq, Turkiye ruling party says
Speaking to broadcaster NTV, Omer Celik said a confirmation mechanism, including officials from Turkish intelligence and the armed forces, will oversee the handover process.
“The disarmament ... process (in Iraq) needs to be completed within three to five months... If it exceeds this period, it will become vulnerable to provocations,” Celik said on NTV.
The PKK, which has been locked in a bloody conflict with the Turkish state for more than four decades, decided in May to disband and end its armed struggle.
PKK militants are set to begin handing over weapons in the northern Iraqi city of Sulaymaniyah on Friday as part of the peace process with Turkiye.
Since the PKK launched its insurgency against Turkiye in 1984 — originally with the aim of creating an independent Kurdish state — the conflict has killed more than 40,000 people, imposed a huge economic burden and fueled social tensions.
Israel’s Bedouin communities use solar energy to stake claim to land
- Bedouin families have for years tried and failed to hold on to their lands, coming up against right-wing groups and hard-line government officials
- For the solar panels to be built, the land must be registered as part of the Bedouin village, strengthening their claim over it
TIRABIN-AL-SANA, Israel: At the end of a dusty road in southern Israel, beyond a Bedouin village of unfinished houses and the shiny dome of a mosque, a field of solar panels gleams in the hot desert sun.
Tirabin Al-Sana in Israel’s Negev desert is the home of the Tirabin (also spelled Tarabin) Bedouin tribe, who signed a contract with an Israeli solar energy company to build the installation.
The deal has helped provide jobs for the community as well as promote cleaner, cheaper energy for the country, as the power produced is pumped into the national grid.
Earlier this month, the Al-Ghanami family in the town of Abu Krinat a little further south inaugurated a similar field of solar panels.
Bedouin families have for years tried and failed to hold on to their lands, coming up against right-wing groups and hard-line government officials.
Demolition orders issued by Israeli authorities plague Bedouin villages, threatening the traditionally semi-nomadic communities with forced eviction.
But Yosef Abramowitz, co-chair of the non-profit organization Shamsuna, said solar field projects help them to stake a more definitive claim.
“It secures their land rights forever,” he told AFP.
“It’s the only way to settle the Bedouin land issue and secure 100 percent renewable energy,” he added, calling it a “win, win.”
For the solar panels to be built, the land must be registered as part of the Bedouin village, strengthening their claim over it.
Rise in home demolitions
Roughly 300,000 Bedouins live in the Negev desert, half of them in places such as Tirabin Al-Sana, including some 110,000 who reside in villages not officially recognized by the government.
Villages that are not formally recognized are fighting the biggest battle to stay on the land.
Far-right groups, some backed by the current government of Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, have stepped up efforts in the past two years to drive these families away.
A sharp increase in home demolitions has left the communities vulnerable and whole families without a roof over their heads.
“Since 2023, more than 8,500 buildings have been demolished in these unrecognized villages,” Marwan Abu Frieh, from the legal aid organization Adalah, told AFP at a recent protest in Beersheva, the largest city in the Negev.
“Within these villages, thousands of families are now living out in the open, an escalation the Negev has not witnessed in perhaps the last two decades.”
Tribes just want to “live in peace and dignity,” following their distinct customs and traditions, he said.
Gil Yasur, who also works with Shamsuna developing critical infrastructure in Bedouin villages, said land claims issues were common among Bedouins across the Negev.
Families who include a solar project on their land, however, stand a better chance of securing it, he added.
“Then everyone will benefit — the landowners, the country, the Negev,” he said. “This is the best way to move forward to a green economy.”
Fully solar-energized
In Um Batin, a recognized village, residents are using solar energy in a different way — to power a local kindergarten all year round.
Until last year, the village relied on power from a diesel generator that polluted the air and the ground where the children played.
Now, a hulking solar panel shields the children from the sun as its surface sucks up the powerful rays, keeping the kindergarten in full working order.
“It was not clean or comfortable here before,” said Nama Abu Kaf, who works in the kindergarten.
“Now we have air conditioning and a projector so the children can watch television.”
Hani Al-Hawashleh, who oversees the project on behalf of Shamsuna, said the solar energy initiative for schools and kindergartens was “very positive.”
“Without power you can’t use all kinds of equipment such as projectors, lights in the classrooms and, on the other hand, it saves costs and uses clean energy,” he said.
The projects are part of a pilot scheme run by Shamsuna.
Asked if there was interest in expanding to other educational institutions that rely on polluting generators, he said there were challenges and bureaucracy but he hoped to see more.
More than 17 million people in Yemen are going hungry, including over 1 million children, UN says
- Number of children with acute malnutrition could surge to 1.2 million early next year, says humanitarian chief Tom Fletcher
- Plummeting global funding for humanitarian aid in Yemen has resulted in drastic reductions or cuts in food, he said
UNITED NATIONS: More than 17 million people in conflict-torn Yemen are going hungry, including over a million children under the age of 5 who are suffering from “life-threatening acute malnutrition,” the United Nations humanitarian chief said Wednesday.
Tom Fletcher told the UN Security Council that the food security crisis in the Arab world’s poorest country, which is beset by civil war, has been accelerating since late 2023.
The number of people going hungry could climb to over 18 million by September, he warned, and the number of children with acute malnutrition could surge to 1.2 million early next year, “leaving many at risk of permanent physical and cognitive damage.”
According to experts who produce the Integrated Food Security Phase Classification, a leading international authority that ranks the severity of hunger, more than 17,000 Yemenis are in the three worst categories of food insecurity — crisis stage or worse.
Fletcher said the UN hasn’t seen the current level of deprivation since before a UN-brokered truce in early 2022. He noted that it is unfolding as global funding for humanitarian aid is plummeting, which means reductions or cuts in food. According to the UN, as of mid-May, the UN’s $2.5 billion humanitarian appeal for Yemen this year had received just $222 million, just 9 percent.
Yemen has been embroiled in civil war since 2014, when Iranian-backed Houthi rebels seized the capital of Sanaa, forcing the internationally recognized government into exile in Saudi Arabia. A Saudi-led coalition intervened months later and has been battling the rebels since 2015 to try and restore the government.
The war has devastated Yemen, created one of the world’s worst humanitarian disasters, and turned into a stalemated proxy conflict. More than 150,000 people, including fighters and civilians, have been killed.
Hans Grundberg, the UN special envoy for Yemen, told the council in a video briefing that two Houthi attacks on commercial vessels in the Red Sea this week – the first in over seven months – and Israeli airstrikes on the capital and key ports are escalating the conflict.
The Houthis have vowed to keep targeting vessels in the key waterway until the war in Gaza ends.
Grundberg said freedom of navigation in the Red Sea must be safeguarded and stressed that “Yemen must not be drawn deeper into regional crises that threaten to unravel the already extremely fragile situation in the country.”
“The stakes for Yemen are simply too high,” he said. “Yemen’s future depends on our collective resolve to shield it from further suffering and to give its people the hope and dignity they so deeply deserve.”
Grundberg warned that a military solution to the civil war “remains a dangerous illusion that risks deepening Yemen’s suffering.”
Negotiations offer the best hope to address the complex conflict, he said, and the longer it is drawn out “there is a risk that divisions could deepen further.”
Grundberg said both sides must signal a willingness to explore peaceful avenues — and an important signal would be the release of all conflict-related detainees. The parties have agreed to an all-for-all release, he said, but the process has stagnated for over a year.
Israel insists on keeping troops in Gaza. That complicates truce talks with Hamas
- Keeping a foothold in the Morag corridor is a key element in Israel’s plan to drive hundreds of thousands of Palestinians south toward a narrow swath of land along the border with Egypt
JERUSALEM: As Israel and Hamas move closer to a ceasefire agreement, Israel says it wants to maintain troops in a southern corridor of the Gaza Strip — a condition that could derail the talks.
An Israeli official said an outstanding issue in the negotiations was Israel’s desire to keep forces in the territory during a 60-day truce, including in the east-west axis that Israel calls the Morag corridor. The official spoke on condition of anonymity because they weren’t authorized to talk with the media about the negotiations.
Keeping a foothold in the Morag corridor is a key element in Israel’s plan to drive hundreds of thousands of Palestinians south toward a narrow swath of land along the border with Egypt, into what it has termed a “humanitarian city.”
Critics fear the move is a precursor to the coerced relocation of much of Gaza’s population of some 2 million people, and part of the Israeli government’s plans to maintain lasting control over the territory.
Hamas, which still holds dozens of hostages and refuses calls by Israel to surrender, wants Israel to withdraw all of its troops as part of any permanent truce. It is adamantly opposed to any lasting Israeli presence inside Gaza.
As part of the proposed truce, Israel and Hamas would hold fire for 60 days, during which time some hostages would be freed and more aid would enter Gaza.
Previous demands by Israel to maintain troops in a separate corridor stalled progress on a ceasefire deal for months.
The office of Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu declined to comment on how the Morag corridor was playing into ceasefire talks. Netanyahu was in Washington this week to discuss the ceasefire and other matters with US President Donald Trump, who has pushed both sides to bring an end to the war in Gaza.
Israel’s desire to keep troops in Gaza was among the ceasefire sticking points discussed Tuesday by senior officials from the US, Israel and Qatar, according to a White House official who spoke on condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to comment publicly.
“We want to have peace. We want to get the hostages back. And I think we’re close to doing it,” Trump said Wednesday in response to a question about the officials’ meeting.
Hamas said in a statement late Wednesday that Israeli troop withdrawal from Gaza was one of several remaining sticking points in the talks, without mentioning Morag specifically.
Morag corridor is one of three that carve up Gaza
During their 21-month campaign in Gaza, Israeli forces have seized wide swaths of land, including three east-west corridors that have carved up the Palestinian enclave.
In April, Israel seized the Morag corridor — named after a Jewish settlement that existed in Gaza before Israel withdrew from the territory in 2005.
The corridor, located between Gaza’s southernmost city of Rafah and its second-largest city Khan Younis, stretches about 12 kilometers (7 miles) from Israel to the Mediterranean coast and is about 1 kilometer (half a mile) wide.
At the time, Netanyahu said it was part of a strategy of “increasing the pressure step by step” on Hamas.
Netanyahu called Morag a “second Philadelphi,” referring to another corridor that runs along Gaza’s border with Egypt. Israel has repeatedly insisted it must maintain control of Philadelphi to prevent cross-border arms smuggling. Egypt denies arms are moved through its territory.
Since the collapse of the last ceasefire in March, Israel has also reasserted control of the Netzarim corridor, which cuts off Gaza’s northern third from the rest of the territory and which it used to prevent Palestinians from returning to northern Gaza before the last truce.
It was not immediately clear how Israeli troops in the Netzarim and Philadelphi corridors factor into the ceasefire negotiations.
Morag allows Israel to set its population movement plan into motion
The foothold in Morag has effectively cut the Rafah area off from the rest of Gaza.
Rafah, once a city of tens of thousands of people, is currently all but flattened and emptied of its population following Israeli evacuation orders.
With those conditions in place, Israel says it seeks to turn the Rafah area into a “sterile zone” free of Hamas militants where it wants to move hundreds of thousands of Palestinians into a “humanitarian city.”
Most of Gaza’s population has already been displaced multiple times throughout the war and squeezed into ever smaller pieces of land. Rights groups see the planned new push to get them to head south as forcible displacement.
Israel’s idea is to use Morag as a screening zone for Palestinians being moved south, to prevent Hamas from infiltrating the area, according to Kobi Michael, a senior researcher at two think tanks, the Institute for National Security Studies and Misgav. That would allow Israeli troops to operate further north without Palestinian civilians getting caught in the crossfire, he said.
A no-go for Hamas
Michael said the move might allow Israel to ramp up the pressure on — and possibly defeat — Hamas in northern Gaza, where guerilla-style fighting continues to dog Israeli troops. And that, he added, could lay the groundwork for an end to the war, which Israel has vowed to continue until Hamas is destroyed.
But critics say the plan to move Palestinians south paves the way for the expulsion of Palestinians from the territory and for Israel to assert control over it, a priority for Netanyahu’s powerful far-right governing partners.
Netanyahu has said that any departures would be “voluntary.” But Palestinians and human rights groups fear that concentrating the population in an area hard-hit by the war with little infrastructure would create catastrophic conditions that leave Palestinians no choice but to leave.
Michael Milshtein, an Israeli expert on Palestinian affairs and former military intelligence officer, called the plan to move Palestinians south through the Morag corridor a “crazy fantasy.” He said the current negotiations could crumble over the Israeli demand because it signaled to Hamas that Israel does not intend to withdraw forces after the ceasefire expires, something Hamas will not accept.
“For Hamas, it’s a no-go,” he said. “If those are the terms, I can’t see Hamas agreeing.”
UN mission in Libya urges immediate de-escalation in Tripoli
- Call follows reports of continued military buildup in and around the capital city
- Libya has had little stability since a 2011 NATO-backed uprising ousted longtime ruler Muammar Qaddafi
TRIPOLI: The UN Mission in Libya urged on Wednesday all Libyan parties to avoid actions or political rhetoric that could trigger escalation or renewed clashes in Tripoli, following reports of continued military buildup in and around the city.
Libyan Prime Minister Abdulhamid Al-Dbeibah ordered in May the dismantling of what he called irregular armed groups, which was followed by Tripoli’s fiercest clashes in years between two armed groups that killed at least eight civilians.
“The Mission continues its efforts to help de-escalate the situation and calls on all parties to engage in good faith toward this end ... Forces recently deployed in Tripoli must withdraw without delay,” the UN Mission said on social media.
A Tripoli-based Government of National Unity under Al-Dbeibah was installed through a UN-backed process in 2021 but the Benghazi-based House of Representatives no longer recognizes its legitimacy.
Libya has had little stability since a 2011 NATO-backed uprising ousted longtime autocrat Muammar Qaddafi. The country split in 2014 between rival eastern and western factions, though an outbreak of major warfare paused with a truce in 2020.
While eastern Libya has been dominated for a decade by commander Khalifa Haftar and his Libyan National Army, control in Tripoli and western Libya has been splintered among numerous armed factions.
