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Al-Ahram Weekly 21 - 27 October 1999 Issue No. 452 
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Published in Cairo by AL-AHRAM established in 1875 |
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Al-Ahram Weekly 21 - 27 October 1999 Issue No. 452
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| Published in Cairo by AL-AHRAM established in 1875 |
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Egypt Region International Economy Opinion Culture Features Profile Travel Living Sports People Time Out Chronicles Cartoons Letters Playing with fire
By Graham UsherLast week, the special Israeli government committee submitted its "compromise solution" for the simmering conflict in Nazareth between the municipality and the town's Islamist movement. As predicted, the deal gives the go-ahead to the municipality to build a plaza beside the Catholic Church of the Annunciation in readiness for the millions of tourists that are expected to visit Nazareth for the millennium. But it also sets aside around 700 metres of the lot for the Waqf (the Muslim Religious Endowment) to build a mosque next to the tomb of the Muslim martyr Shihab Al-Din.
Israel is "aware of the desperate situation of Muslims in the city vis-à-vis places of worship," said committee head and internal security minister, Shlomo Ben-Ami, on announcing the decision. But no cornerstone for the new mosque would be laid unless "by 8 November" the Islamist movement removed the "protest tent" that currently stands on the site. Finally, "to ensure the freedom and complete security of the Christian faithful in the town", the mosque would have to be "clearly separated" from the church and a police station would be attached to a "new tourist office" intended for the plaza, he said.
The trade-off pleased nobody. Within hours of the deal's publication, the Vatican signalled its displeasure. "Such a situation [i.e. the construction of a mosque on the site] does not help in the preparation of a possible pilgrimage of the Holy Father [the Pope] to that illustrious sanctuary [the Church of the Annunciation]," a visit that is now ever-more tentatively scheduled for March next year. Nor were Nazareth's Islamists impressed with what they called Ben-Ami's "revised decision".
For Friday prayers on 15 October, some 2,000 Palestinians gathered beneath the white canvas and black awnings of the "mosque of Shihab Al-Din" to hear sound and fury from the leader of the majority Islamist bloc on the municipality, Salman Abu Ahmed. He railed against the Pope's attempts to prevent "the right of Muslims to build a mosque on Muslim land", and warned of "dangerous" consequences should the Israeli police try to dismantle the tent "by force". One week before, Abu Ahmed had cautiously welcomed the Ben-Ami compromise. What had changed?
"We agreed with Ben-Ami's proposal to allocate 700 metres to build a mosque," he said. "But we reject totally that a wall should be built between the mosque and the square or that a police station be put in the square. What is this? Do churches and synagogues need police stations? Is a mosque a prison? It's the Christians who insisted on a wall. There is no equality in Israel," he concluded gloomily. "The Jews come first, then the Christians, then the Druze and at the bottom comes the Muslims." Still, he added, he "didn't want to see any problems between Muslims and Christians" in Nazareth.
He is unlikely to get his wish. One day after Abu Ahmed made those comments, the mayor of Nazareth (and the principal villain of the piece as far as the Islamists are concerned), Ramez Jeraisi, was set upon by a gang of men with clubs, knives and a sword. Jeraisi says he knows the culprits were members of Nazareth's Islamist movement, but will not register their names to the Israeli authorities in "protest at the non-action by the police for the past two years" in the face of "threats by the Islamic party". Abu Ahmed denies that the attackers had any affiliation with the Islamist movement. What is undeniable is that this is the second time Jeraisi has been assaulted in four months.
It may not be the last, says Lutfy Mashour, editor of Nazareth's As-Sennara newspaper. For him, the saddest aspect of the entire sectarian debacle over "the church, the mosque, Shihab Al-Din and I don't know what" is that it has squandered a "unique opportunity" for the people of Nazareth. "For the first time in 51 years, the millennium festivities gave the municipality the chance to demand from the government at least a semblance of equal budgets for the town." But with less than three months to go before year 2000, "Nazareth doesn't even have a functioning municipality, let alone roads, hotels or infrastructure" to accommodate the tourists, he says.
And he apportions equal blame to all parties to the conflict. He blames the previous Israeli government for its policies of "divide and rule" in the town and the Islamist movement for "playing into their hands". But, as "a Christian, Arab and native of Nazareth", he also accuses certain "personalities" in the Vatican whose behaviour in Nazareth has been "neither helpful nor Christian nor just". And unless some "wisdom" is shown by all concerned, he warns, the situation could become incendiary.
"Six months ago, I told an adviser to Israel's last prime minister that, with any more abuse, the people here could burn Nazareth to the ground. I also told him that if Nazareth were to become Beirut, the flames would reach Tel Aviv."
It is to avert such a scenario that Mashour believes that both the mayor and the majority Islamist "opposition" on the municipality should accept the Ben-Ami compromise. "It's not fair or just or good, but the two sides got themselves into this mess. The least they can do is offer the people a way out," he says.
As the tent mosque empties after the noon prayers, most of Nazareth's Christian and Muslim residents seem to be more interested in selling and shopping in the old souq on Casa Nova Street than sorting themselves by sect or religion. But one Nazarene is agitated. "I want to tell you we are Arabs before we are Muslims or Christians," he says. Yes -- but he should tell that to the Israeli government. And then he should tell it to his Palestinian "leaders" in the municipality, Islamist movement and churches.
