ENTERING
PALESTINE: THE CHECKPOINT
I arrived at the Tel Aviv airport at about 1:20 am on
Tuesday, November 25.
It had been a long trip, from Des Moines to Minneapolis
to Amsterdam, and finally to Tel Aviv.
In Amsterdam I had a seven-hour layover in the airport.
There I visited the airport religious center and spent
some time in prayer. As I entered there were a group of
Muslim men, facing Mecca and praying. I sat down in the
opposite corner, near an altar and prayed. As I left I
saw a Jewish man – with phylacteries –
praying in another corner. Would that it were all that
simple!
In Tel Aviv I passed quickly through customs. Being a
white US male in his late fifties on pilgrimage probably
saved me from the intensive questioning and body search
that some experience when entering Israel.
My friend Omar was there to meet me. We traveled to
Bethlehem in a van owned and operated by a Palestinian
who had a Jerusalem identity card and whose car was
registered in Israel. As we took the four lane highway
toward Jerusalem, Omar explained the three types of
identification cards Palestinians might have. Those who
live in Israel might have Israeli ids; those who lived in
East Jerusalem when it was annexed during the 1967 war
have Jerusalem ids; the rest, on the West Bank and Gaza,
would have only Palestinians ids. Currently, only
Palestinians with Israeli and Jerusalem ids have easier
access between Israel and Palestine; the other
Palestinians need special permission to leave the West
Bank or Gaza for Israel.
We passed around Jerusalem and headed toward Bethlehem.
There we stopped at the checkpoint for Bethlehem. We
waited for about ten minutes until the Israeli border
guards motioned us to come forward. They inspected my
passport and waived us on.
We were fortunate. We had a driver and a van that were
allowed to pass and the two passengers had US passports.
At this checkpoint – as I would experience many
other times – Palestinians who live in Bethlehem
wait to see if they will be allowed through, even if they
have proper papers.
THE
HUMILITY OF THE NATIVITY
The first morning Omar and I walked from his apartment at
the International Center of Bethlehem to Manger Square,
just a few blocks downhill form the International Center
of Bethlehem where I was staying with Omar.
We
crossed the nearly empty square and entered the Church of
the Nativity through a small door, bending low to enter.
You can see the frame of the original door which has been
filled in. This small door, called the Door of Humility,
was meant to prevent armed men on horses from entering.
We
walked through the Greek Orthodox Church and went down
about sixteen steps to the Grotto of the Nativity. At the
bottom of the steps, on my right, was a small niche with
an altar and a star in the floor under the altar –
the place of the Lord’s birth. It was smaller than
I had imagined, a fitting place for one born poor.