The siege at the Church of the Nativity

Witness History

BBC

History, Personal Journals, Society & Culture

4.4 • 1.6K Ratings

🗓️ 14 September 2023

⏱️ 10 minutes

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Summary

The Church of the Nativity in Bethlehem is on the site believed by Christians to be the birthplace of Jesus Christ. But in 2002, it was at the centre of one of the most dramatic sieges of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. For almost six weeks, Palestinian gunmen and civilians were holed up in the church. In 2015 Louise Hidalgo spoke to Father Amjad Sabbara, a Franciscan friar who lived in the compound, and to Carolyn Cole, an American photojournalist who managed to get inside the church in the last days of the siege. (Photo: Journalists stand behind barricades guarded by Israeli soldiers metres away from where Palestinians are holed up in the Church of the Nativity. Credit: Gali Tibbon/ AFP via Getty Images)

Transcript

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0:00.0	your listening to the witness history podcast on the BBC World Service. It's 30 years
0:10.8	since the Oslo Accords were signed. This agreement in 1993 aimed to bring about peace
0:17.3	between the Israelis and Palestinians. This week we're bringing new stories from Israeli
0:22.5	and Palestinian history. Today we're going back to the 10th of May 2002 when one of the
0:29.2	most dramatic sieges of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict at the Church of Nativity in Bethlehem
0:36.6	finally came to an end after six weeks. In 2015 Louise Hidalgo spoke to two people who were there.
0:50.4	For 38 days a group of Palestinian gunmen, civilians and nuns and monks have been
0:56.1	holed up inside one of Christianity's most holy sites. The Church of Nativity in Bethlehem
1:02.6	surrounded by the Israeli army. Among those inside is American press photographer Carolyn Cole.
1:09.4	People were exhausted, some people were sick, people were hungry, and I guess the overriding was
1:15.2	feeling when is it going to end finally on the 10th of May. Negotiators reached a deal.
1:20.5	The Palestinians who were most wanted by the Israelis would go into exile. The rest could leave.
1:26.4	I remember in the last few hours we weren't sleeping and there were some men that were in charge
1:32.2	of cataloging all of the weapons that were inside the Church that were going to be turned over.
1:37.2	I do remember when the men were saying goodbye to the leader of the Al-Aqsa Mara Brigade who
1:43.1	was going into exile in Cyprus, Ibrahim Abayat, and I had taken a portrait of him earlier in the
1:49.6	week. I didn't really know his background. I had no idea why he was the most wanted man in the
1:55.6	Church, but there was a group of them who left the Church first and so all the other men were
2:01.9	gathering around them. They made a line and everyone was hugging as those men left.
2:06.6	It's 8 o'clock on Friday, the 10th of May. The news headlines this morning, the siege of the
2:11.0	Church of the Nativity in Bethlehem is finally over. All the Palestinians are out 13,
2:15.7	are going to be flown into exile by the RAF.
	...

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