Bethlehem is beautiful. I spent a summer studying Arabic and living with a Palestinian family when I was pregnant with Alex. It was a tense time politically in the region. My memories are of Palestinian families hiding in their homes as tanks patrolled the neighborhood, a child scratching his fingernails deep into my neck when guns' blasted, hundreds of young men lost without work waiting in the streets for something to change, and dozens of tourist shops empty without the busloads of visitors that use to take over the downtown.
This city of Christians now has a Muslim majority due to the occupation, and political as well as economic strangulation of its people by the Israeli government's policies. I took my little babies to this city, the birth place of the little baby Jesus. Both Alex and Serene visited the Church of the Nativity when they were less than three months old. These days, its hard to describe, but the city is less tense. When Israel opens its checkpoints, tourists still love to visit. Tall cement wall lock its people in like prison.
We tried to enjoy the tourist shops, hot tea on a rainy day, wonderful hospitality and hope for days when Serene, Alex, and all their cousins, will not need to walk through gates or be frisked by Israeli soldiers to come and go.
