The Palestinian gunmen who holed up at the Church of the Nativity trashed the place before they left. The Greek Orthodox monks were furious, as the Palestinans consumed huge amounts of food, liquor (so much for Paradise in their case!), and committed other acts of petty vandalism.
Angry Orthodox priests yesterday showed two reporters about 20 empty bottles of whiskey, champagne, vodka, cognac and French wine on a kitchen shelf and on the floor of two rooms.
"They should be ashamed of themselves. They acted like animals, like greedy monsters. Come, I will show you more," said one priest, who declined to give his name.
He gestured toward empty bottles of Israeli-brewed Maccabi beer and hundreds of cigarette butts strewn on the floor.
The priest then took the reporters to see computers taken apart and a television set dismantled for use as a hiding place for weapons.
"You can see what repayment we got for ‘hosting’ these so-called guests," said Archbishop Ironius, another cleric, as he showed reporters the main reception hall of the Greek Orthodox Monastery.
If that disgrace weren’t enough, while the gunmen wined, dined, and got liquored up, Palestinian civilians who were trapped in the Church with them went hungry.
A church helper, who gave his name as Milad, said the quantity of food consumed by the gunmen in the first 15 days should have lasted for six months.
As they feasted and boozed, Palestinian civilians subsisted on a meager diet, with barely enough for a single meal a day.
Yet it doesn’t end there. Those compassionate and tolerant members of the Fatah movement, led by Yassir Arafat also desecrated Christian objects and Bibles.
Considering that this whole al-Aqsa intifada was started when Ariel Sharon went up to the Temple Mount – not entering a mosque, but merely walking around, shouldn’t the Christian churches be up in arms? These gunmen endangered the lives of civilians, desecrated one of the holiest sites in Christianity, and generally acted like savages. What do they get for these acts? – a nice vacation in Cyprus.
No, they should be put on trial as war criminals and sentenced to hard labor for the rest of their lives. Yet, the international community seems to be more focused on digging up some dirt on Israel than dealing with such monsters. It just goes to show what kind of people we’re dealing with in this conflict. Making peace with terrorists like the one who sieged the Church of the Nativity is a fools errand.
