Bittar is an artist and lives in North Park.
Growing up Melkite Catholic, I embraced Christmas as a child. I collected moss from my grandparents’ home in the mountains of Lebanon above Beirut. I carpeted the moss around their creche with interspersed cotton fluff to resemble snow. Flint and smooth saffron pebbles outlined the wooden manger to mimic boulders. It was magical.
A decade ago, when visiting my aunt in the same village, we witnessed Shia pilgrims collect holy water from a spring honoring the Virgin Mary. I then discovered that Muslims embrace Christian stories and view Jesus as a prophet. The iconic mother and child image takes on a pointed and personal meaning this Christmas. The children of Gaza embrace the symbolism of Jesus, born in an exposed manger with only farm animals and his parents to keep him warm. Gaza’s children, scantily dressed, keep each other warm by huddling with family, pets and fellow survivors this winter.
Christmas for Palestinians here and abroad is not business as usual. Around the world bold demonstrations for Palestinian rights show red and green colors like Christmas. However, Palestinians in Bethlehem — Christian and Muslim — are in the depths of unending grief. The Church of the Nativity displayed infant Jesus amidst rubble. Palestinians connect to the teachings of Jesus, but not the usual rich celebrations with marching bands, dancers, bagpipes and lights.
We mourn all the indiscriminate deaths in Gaza. Among the more than 20,000 dead, two women were killed in Gaza’s only Catholic Church. Early in the conflict, the Church of St. Porphyrius, among the oldest churches in the world, was bombed and 16 people died. My colleague at the American Arab Anti-Discrimination Committee office based in Washington, D.C., lost his cousin, cousin’s wife and their six-and-a-half month old baby girl at St. Porphyrius.
The American public holds a place for the suffering Gazans, as recent polls show. Americans want the fighting to end and call for diplomatic channels to take hold. Palestinian Americans with allies march outside in parks and streets demanding a ceasefire and the end of the 75-year long Israeli occupation. These protests also tell the story of how elected officials push us outside. What is controversial about acknowledging and embracing empathy to both Jewish and Palestinian Americans? Why is a ceasefire with an astronomical death toll controversial? Are our elected leaders capable or permitted to show comion to the more than 1 million people homeless and hungry in Gaza?
I believe that militias of any kind are the result of old men (with some old women) sending young men (and and some young women) to cover and justify their failures. War is usually an unnecessary drama of chaos and horror requiring the dehumanization of other human beings.
Religious people in power often quote scripture, selectively. While the Ten Commandments are for human beings to follow, why do we constantly justify not following them? “Judgment Day” is a revelation common to all Abrahamic faiths. However, too many leaders of all faiths think they can submit their contributions to the apocalypse as if God has asked them to. These “leaders” have severe hubris and narcissism. The apocalypse, if you believe in the intent of scripture, can only be decreed by God and not by humankind. Do our elected leaders here and abroad think they are God because they have more weapons?
In Gaza, we see an unfolding and epic story about human suffering, resilience and love, often expressed by Arab men. Don’t look away. The world is learning from Gazans how to broadly love their families, their neighbors and even their tormentors. Those who lost everyone and everything are told by Palestinian men and women that they are now part of other families.
This Christmas, I pray and wish that newly merged families find warm embraces in Gaza and that all Palestinians attain life, freedom and peace. The ceasefire is the beginning. We cannot return to human bondage and inhumanity or it will take us right back to war. Share Palestinian stories of resilience, patience and community on social media @hiddenpalestine and @we_are_not_numbers.
