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Political Grinches Stealing Christmas From Palestinian and Syrian Refugees

26.05.13

Church officials in Damascus advanced the hour of last night’s traditional Christmas Eve midnight service to 6 pm because few Damascenes’ venture out past sunset these days. The reasons include ubiquitous checkpoints, security fears and the fact that there are few taxis and no buses around. Plus most shops and cafes close early and the thuds and whining of artillery and bomb blasts from this ancient city’s suburbs tend to sound more menacing at night.

But that does not mean that Notre Dame and other churches in Damascus were not over-flowing with Christians and Muslims for Christmas Eve service, which has become an ecumenical event in this secular country where Syrian and Palestinian refugees of both faiths attended from Yarmouk camp and elsewhere.  One Palestinian friend, who had been turned away at the Lebanese border at Maznaa  just three days earlier, explained that his family was celebrating ” both the birth of Jesus Christ and the birth of the state of Palestine” referencing last month’s  130 to 8 UN General Assembly vote.

Source: CounterPunch