There is a chapter in the Nativity story that is not usually included in children’s Christmas pageants.
Most people with a passing relationship to Christianity know the outlines of the first Christmas: a pregnant virgin ends up giving birth to Jesus, the son of God, in a stable in Bethlehem. But King Herod is threatened by the prophecy that this child will grow up to be “the king of the Jews,” and “sent forth, and slew all the children that were in Bethlehem, and in all the coasts thereof, from two years old and under.”
And then “in Rama was there a voice heard, lamentation, and weeping, and great mourning, Rachel weeping for her children, and would not be comforted.” This part of the story is known as “The Massacre of the Innocents.”
The biblical city Rama is now known as Al-Ram. It’s a Palestinian city located in the West Bank. And did you know that the little town of Bethlehem that most of us hear about every Christmas season, in carols and stories, is also a Palestinian town?
“All the coasts thereof” makes me think only of Gaza, currently under ceaseless Israeli bombardment. The United States government is supporting this. After all, we have a 20-year-plus tradition of bombing the crap out of Muslim lands and people in the name of “defeating terrorism,” which never seems to be defeated.
I grew up hearing about the horrors of al-Qaida, then ISIS, now Hamas. We keep throwing our military might at these terrorist groups and yet never seem secure. In the news and on social media, I keep seeing pictures and videos of dead Palestinian children, injured Palestinian children, traumatized Palestinian children. And I see Palestinian parents weeping, screaming for those children. My mom lost a child once. We take this suffering quite seriously in our family; we know of what we speak.
According to analysis by the Israeli newspaper Haaretz, 61% of deaths by Israeli airstrikes in the first three weeks of the offensive were civilian deaths.
And that counts deaths from airstrikes, not from the diseases spreading through the crowded conditions in southern Gaza, not from hunger resulting in a food blockade, not from lack of medical care from hospitals that can no longer get supplies or electricity. What else can you call this but a massacre of the innocents?
According to a November statement by the World Health Organization, there were roughly 50,000 pregnant women in Gaza and about 180 babies being born every day. Millions of American Christians will go to their Christmas masses and pageants this year and hear an ancient story about a woman giving birth in a stable. I wonder how many of them will think about the hundreds of women in the Holy Land giving birth in bombed-out hospitals and makeshift camps and shelters. By one estimate, at least 42% of houses in Gaza have been destroyed; like Mary and Joseph, those pregnant women are going to have to seek shelter wherever they can.
The Israeli government and military is trying to get rid of Hamas. King Herod was trying to get rid of the infant Jesus. In both situations, children, through no fault of their own, are caught in the middle and killed.
“Collateral damage” is the official term, right? Collateral damage is part of the Christmas story. And we Americans, and especially those who claim the title “Christian,” need to seriously think about whether we want our tax dollars to continue paying for these bombs.
Is 61% civilian deaths an acceptable number? A lot of Americans and members of our federal government seem to think it is. I don’t.
And what is the endgame? How many buildings in Gaza will be allowed to stay standing? What will happen to the children born amidst the ruin and death? Trauma at a young age affects the brain negatively. What are the chances that the children of Gaza, born into indiscriminate violence, will end up choosing the path of peace?
In the short term, sure, it’s easier for a country to drop bombs from the safety of the sky than to send in soldiers on the ground. In the long term? Indiscriminate violence, mass death, political repression and material deprivation are breeding grounds for terrorism.
Jesus was born in the Holy Land in a time of political turmoil. Today, Palestinian boys and girls are being born in the Holy Land in a time of political turmoil. I can only hope that, like Jesus, one of them grows up to be a bringer of peace.
Victoria Hugo-Vidal is a Maine millennial. She can be contacted at:
themainemillennial@gmail.com
Twitter: @mainemillennial
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