Oh Little Town of Bethlehem, How Still (?) We See Thee Lie...

Things in Bethlehem were pretty and quiet for the first couple of days here but yesterday, there were 2 protests about Gaza in the street in front of the Bible College. The first was a non-violent march down the street waving flags and shouting but in a more uniformed way (the leader shouted threw a loud speaker and the followers shouted back maybe repeating what he said).


(1st Protest - A non-violent march against the many innocent lives of men, women, & children killed in Gaza)

The 2nd protest we watched from our window as a whole crowd of mainly young palestinians (some only boys) shouted, waved flags, and threw rocks at the Israeli guard tower down the street near Rachel's Tomb. The Israeli soldiers responded with tear gas and other methods from the tower. Then through the efforts of the Palestinian soldiers and police, as well as the Israeli soldiers (who were on the ground near the end) the protest was dispersed.

(2nd Protest - Notice the wall in the background & the Israeli guard tower to the left that the protesters are throwing stones at)

Other than that there have been some non-violent protest in other parts of the area, the city has cancelled all public activities in protest of Gaza, and they have had days that all business shut down in protest as well.

Despite all of that, Aaron and I have felt very safe here and walked to the Church of the Nativity for the midnight orthodox Christmas Eve celebration and then walked back at 2am eating a falafel (which was absolutely delicious).

On a different Subject, I found out from the English Administrator that the college needs pens (black, red, & blue), post-it notes (large & small), clear packing tape (but not more than an inch wide), and white board markers. She said that either they can't get these items here, they are too expensive, or the quality is horrible. She is going to talk to some of the staff on Monday when school starts back up and ask them what else they might need.

Misty (& Aaron)