CV NEWS FEED // Christians in Jerusalem and the West Bank are facing both discrimination for their faith and unprecedented rates of unemployment, according to a recent report from Aid to the Church in Need (ACN) International.
These issues “are the biggest challenges facing Christians in the West Bank and Jerusalem,” ACN stated in a press release. Christians in the Holy Land are experiencing “a dire situation as the war in Gaza and escalating tensions between Israelis and Palestinians continue to take their toll.”
The unemployment rate in the Holy Land has risen to an unprecedented record of 72 percent, according to ACN.
The region is afflicted with “a widespread economic crisis, leaving numerous families in a fight for simple survival after losing their sources of income due to the total paralysis of the tourism sector, mass layoffs and severe restrictions on freedom of movement,” ACN reported:
On the other hand, the decision of the Israeli authorities to replace Palestinians in the labour market has created a long-term problem. Over 80 thousand Indian workers are expected to arrive in the country to take over jobs once held by Palestinians.
This information, which has been circulating in Israeli media, has been confirmed to ACN by several local sources and could be partly linked to a reprisal for the attacks of last October, aimed at isolating and marginalising the Palestinians, Christians and Muslims alike.
ACN is an international foundation that has provided emergency aid to hundreds of families in the Holy Land, in cooperation with the Latin Patriarch of Jerusalem, Cardinal Pierbattista Pizzaballa. This aid includes medicine, food subsidies, and financial assistance for overdue utility bills.
A local source, who chose to remain anonymous, told ACN, “Unfortunately, the relationship of trust between Israel and the Palestinians has been torn apart, and it is unlikely that it will be restored over the next decades… This will have a deep effect on the Christian community in the Holy Land.”
Palestinian Christians are also facing increasing rates of discrimination for their faith, according to ACN.
“Wearing a cross can get you into trouble… Sometimes you have to hide your identity in your own homeland, to avoid problems,” the anonymous source said, according to ACN:
“The presence in the area of groups with increasingly radical elements makes our situation even more difficult. Christians are caught between two fronts, a particularly vulnerable position”, the source confirms, in reference to both ultra-Orthodox Jews and Muslim extremists in different parts of the region.
In Jerusalem, priests, Christian pilgrims, and religious persons have experienced “repeated cases of verbal abuse” directed at them, ACN noted.
