{"id":4346,"date":"2025-10-16T17:03:17","date_gmt":"2025-10-16T17:03:17","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/4346\/"},"modified":"2025-10-16T17:03:17","modified_gmt":"2025-10-16T17:03:17","slug":"bethlehem-mayor-meets-pope-and-appeals-for-hope-and-solidarity","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/4346\/","title":{"rendered":"Bethlehem Mayor meets Pope and appeals for hope and solidarity"},"content":{"rendered":"

Bethlehem\u2019s mayor greets Pope Leo XIV after the General Audience on Wednesday, and appeals for support to stop the war and preserve the Christian presence in the Holy Land. <\/p>\n

By Linda Bordoni<\/p>\n

Bethlehem\u2019s recently appointed mayor, Maher Nicola Canawati, met Pope Leo XIV on Wednesday morning after the General Audience, carrying with him the concerns of his people and a plea for peace and hope in the Holy Land.<\/p>\n

\u201cActually, the first letter that I wrote when I became the Mayor of Bethlehem was a letter to the Pope, because we believe that from here we can do many things and we can support our people,\u201d he said. \u201cAnd the most important thing is to give them hope.\u201d<\/p>\n

The mayor explained that emigration continues to drain Bethlehem and other Palestinian cities, draining the Holy Land of its Christian presence.<\/p>\n

\u201cPeople have been leaving Bethlehem, leaving Palestine because of what’s happening and what’s going on,\u201d he said, noting that settlements surrounding Bethlehem now rival the city\u2019s own population and put much pressure on resources.<\/p>\n

\n Listen to an excerpt of the interview with Maher Canawati\n <\/p>\n

Meeting with the Pope <\/p>\n

Mayor Canawati, who was appointed in May, said Pope Leo XIV responded to his request for a personal meeting.<\/p>\n

\u201cI had a good time explaining to the Pope how important it is to intervene in what’s happening in Palestine, in Gaza, in Bethlehem, and to preserve the living stones of the Holy Land, because the Holy Land without the living stones is just a mere museum,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n

And describing his meeting with the Holy Father, he added, \u201cAlways, before I talk about Bethlehem, I always pray. And that was my first sentence to the Pope: to intervene so we can stop this war, stop what’s happening to our people in Gaza. And I think this is the top priority that we actually talked about, and he agreed.\u201d<\/p>\n

\"Maher<\/p>\n

\n Maher Canawati at the General Audience \u00a0 (@Vatican Media)\n <\/p>\n

Bethlehem and Christians under pressure <\/p>\n

The mayor painted a stark picture of life in Bethlehem today. \u201cBethlehem used to be 37 km\u00b2. Now, after the annexation and the settlements and the separation wall that separated Bethlehem from its sister and its heart \u2013 Jerusalem \u2013 for the first time in history, means that we’re dealing with a lot of problems as Bethlemites,\u201d he explained.<\/p>\n

Again, he highlighted his concern for the declining numbers of Palestinian Christians in the Palestinian territories.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe Palestinian Christians are now only 168,000 in the Holy Land, while there are over 4 million Palestinian Christians all over the world. That by itself shows how much pressure there is on the Christians,\u201d he noted.<\/p>\n

Canawati, himself a Christian, explained that by law, the mayor of Bethlehem must be Christian, a provision upheld by Palestinian leaders \u201cbecause they want to preserve the Christian community, the oldest Christian community in the world that lives in Bethlehem, in the Holy Land, in Palestine.\u201d<\/p>\n

Yet many are still leaving. \u201cIt breaks my heart for anybody to leave Bethlehem,\u201d he said, noting that in the past year alone, over 1000 Christians got approval “for their immigration to Canada, the United States and other countries.\u201d<\/p>\n

\"The<\/p>\n

\n The desolation in Bethlehem\n <\/p>\n

Collapse of tourism and the economy <\/p>\n

Bethlehem\u2019s economy, dependent on pilgrimage and hospitality, has been devastated since the outbreak of war on 7 October 2023.<\/p>\n

\u201cNow, after 7 of October, we have a drop, a deep drop down to 0%. All of the hotels, that’s 84 hotels, are totally closed. The souvenir shops, the workshops that produce the beautiful olive woodwork, the mother of pearl and the jewellery that we produce in Bethlehem are closed. Totally closed,\u201d Canawati said.<\/p>\n

He described soaring unemployment. \u201cThe unemployment rate jumped from 14 to 65% and as you know, people are denied access work within the Israeli areas.\u201d<\/p>\n

More than 120,000 Bethlemites, he said, used to work outside the city, \u201csome of them had loans, and now they don’t have even to put bread on their table.\u201d<\/p>\n

Water <\/p>\n

Water scarcity and restricted movement further exacerbate the situation, choking the people. Canawati explained that water is rationed as Palestinians in Bethlehem are not allowed to dig and take their own water: \u201cWe buy our water from the Israelis, and they only sell us one fifth of what a person would need per day.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cSome areas in Bethlehem don’t get water for 50 days, 60 days,\u201d the mayor lamented, adding that over 134 barriers and checkpoints \u2013 even inside the city – hinder movement, depriving people not only of their freedom, but of the means to provide for their families and build a future.<\/p>\n

Appeal for solidarity and hope <\/p>\n

Maher Canawati said the surge of solidarity that he has recently experienced in Italy and in other nations makes a tangible difference: \u201cI think this gives more hope to the people, that there is someone caring about us, and they haven’t forgotten about us.\u201d<\/p>\n

He pointed to the support of the Latin Patriarchate and local clergy as \u201cthe best hope for now that we’re getting in Bethlehem.\u201d<\/p>\n

As for how the global community can help, he appealed for support to local organisations: \u201cTo support the people so they don’t leave. And that is the most important thing that we’re trying to do right now.\u201d<\/p>\n

\"File<\/p>\n

\n File photo of the Latin Patriarch of Jerusalem, Cardinal Pizzaballa, celebrating Christmas Mass in the Church of the Nativity in Bethlehem \u00a0 (AFP or licensors)\n <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Bethlehem\u2019s mayor greets Pope Leo XIV after the General Audience on Wednesday, and appeals for support to stop…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":4347,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[14],"tags":[3956,153,155,154,3953,3954,3955,3766,1841,3952],"class_list":{"0":"post-4346","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-bethlehem","8":"tag-appeal","9":"tag-bethlehem","10":"tag-bethlehem-headlines","11":"tag-bethlehem-news","12":"tag-general-audience","13":"tag-holy-land","14":"tag-hope","15":"tag-palestine","16":"tag-pope-leo-xiv","17":"tag-solidarity"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4346","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=4346"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4346\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/4347"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=4346"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=4346"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=4346"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}