Christmas celebrations return to Bethlehem after 2 years of war in Gaza

Bethlehem: For the past two Christmases, John Juka’s family restaurant looked about the same as any business in Bethlehem: shuttered and eerily empty.

But on Saturday evening, it bustled with families and was lit by strings of red lights, a hopeful change in the Palestinian city that’s been reeling since war broke out in Gaza.

Christmas celebrations are slowly returning to the traditional birthplace of Jesus in the Israeli-occupied West Bank.

While a shaky ceasefire holds in Gaza, Palestinians hope the festivities are a step toward a more peaceful future in a region shaken by tragedy.

“It’s not like it was before the war,” 30-year-old Juka said. “But it’s like life is coming back again.”

Tourism and religious pilgrims have long been a prime economic engine for Bethlehem. Around 80 per cent of the Muslim-majority city’s residents live off it, according to the local government.

Those earnings ripple out to communities across the West Bank, a territory long marked by economic precarity.

“When we have 10,000 visitors and pilgrims sleeping in Bethlehem, that means the butcher is working, the supermarket is working and everybody is working,” said Bethlehem Mayor Maher Nicola Canawati. “There’s a ripple effect.”

That economic lifeline vanished when war broke out in Gaza following the Hamas-led October 7, 2023, attack on southern Israel. Bethlehem’s authorities canceled major Christmas celebrations during Israel’s retaliatory offensive in Gaza, whose health ministry has reported over 70,000 Palestinians killed.

At the same time, Israel’s military scaled up operations in the West Bank, including communities near Bethlehem.

The unemployment rate in the city jumped from 14 per cent to 65 per cent, the mayor said. Poverty soared, and about 4,000 people left in search of work.

A United Nations report last month said the West Bank is going through its most severe economic downturn on record, citing the ongoing Israeli military operations.

Now Bethlehem residents seek a comeback.

“The decision we took was to reignite the spirit of Christmas and to reignite hope,” the mayor said.