MK Aryeh Bibi
neously with memorials for late Prime
At Kever Rachel:
“Jewish Holy Places
Must Remain Open”
BY SAMUEL SOKOL,
BETHLEHEM
An estimated 150,000 people came to
pray at the tomb of the Biblical matriarch
Rachel in Bethlehem over the length of
the day on Thursday of last week. The
visit, in honor of Rachel’s hilulah
(yahrzeit), was spearheaded by the
Jerusalem-based Mosdos Kever Rachel
organization. A special focus of this year’s
events was praying for the welfare of kid-
napped IDF soldier Gilad Shalit, who is
currently being held prisoner by the
Hamas terror organization in the Gaza
Strip. Shalit has been in captivity for over
1,200 days.
A special prayer for the swift return of
Shalit was distributed to all people com-
ing to pray at the site.
Robert Weiss, a New York attorney and
philanthropist, was among the sponsors
of Thursday’s events. He explained,
“Gilad’s safe release is a cause that all Jews
must rally behind, and this is a prayer
that comes from the depths of all our
hearts.” He went on to say how signifi-
cant it is that after over 3,000 years, hun-
dreds of thousands of people come to cel-
ebrate the life of a remarkable woman, a
progenitor of the Jewish people.
46 November 6, 2009 5 TOWNS JEWISH TIMES
The celebration took place simulta-
Minister Yitzchak Rabin around the
country, prompting questions by
reporters why there was no special com-
memoration of the slain leader at
Rachel’s Tomb.
It was explained that the commemora-
tion of the hilulah of “Mama Rachel” was
a tradition dating back thousands of
years and entrenched in Jewish tradition
and was an event that could be agreed
upon by the entire political and religious
spectrum of the Jewish people. It would
therefore be inappropriate to mix in any-
thing divisive, controversial, or political
with this religious occasion.
Initial estimates placed the crowd at
100,000 people, but later revisions
declared that 150,000 pilgrims visited the
site. A special hospitality tent was erected
en route to the tomb, serving free snacks
and drinks to visitors. Over 700 crates of
drinks were served and a special truck
was parked outside the holy site with
water and juice dispensers mounted on
its side.
While the tomb is situated in the mid-
dle of the ancient Jewish city of
Bethlehem, its status as a city under
Palestinian Authority jurisdiction has
meant increasing danger for visitors in
recent years. In 1998, a fortified structure
was erected over the tomb and, more
recently, the route through the city was
itself fortified with giant concrete barri-
ers preventing access or even a line of
sight from surrounding buildings.
Bethlehem has been the center of
increasing religious violence since the
Palestinian Authority took over civil and
military administration of the city in
1995. This was in line with the Interim
Agreement on the West Bank and the
Gaza Strip. According to David Bedein,
bureau chief of the Israel Resource
News Agency “the PLO never ratified the
Oslo Accord’s ‘declaration of principles,’
which required the PLO and Fatah to
recognize Israel, denounce terror, and
cancel the PLO/Fatah charter, which
Due to the lawless
and violent nature
of Bethlehem, there
is always a military
and police presence
at the site to protect
worshippers.
calls for Israel’s obliteration.” Since 1995,
there has been a steady exodus of
Christian Arabs from the city, in the face
of religious persecution, street violence
directed against religious minorities,
and attacks against places of worship.
“There is no future for Christians
[here],” said former Bethlehem mayor
Hanna Nasser.
Such violence makes it unsurprising
that Bethlehem was used as the location
for the 2009 Fatah convention, in which
Palestinian Authority president
Mahmoud Abbas repeatedly exclaimed,
“Yes, resistance [terror] is legal, and we
are with this resistance. Our determina-
tion to choose the path of peace and
negotiations does not mean that we
have abandoned our noble path of legit-
imate resistance, which is based on
international law.”
Due to the lawless and violent nature
of Bethlehem, and the general atmos-
phere of religious intolerance, including a
lengthy siege of the Church of the
Nativity in 2002, there is always a military
and police presence at the site to protect
worshippers.
The concrete barriers ensure that
Rachel’s Tomb will not be desecrated in
the manner of Joseph’s tomb in Shechem,
which was burned to the ground by an
Arab mob after the Barak administration
withdrew from the site in 2000.
MK Aryeh Bibi of the Kadima party
came to represent the Knesset and the
government of Israel. “I am here at
Rachel’s Tomb because it is the day of the
burial of the matriarch Rachel and I think
that Jewish holy places must remain
open and that Jews should be able to pray
at any holy site, at every holy gravesite in
all of the land of Israel, in every part of
the land of Israel,” Bibi explained. Bibi
concluded his prepared remarks by
recounting his work as a police com-
mander in the Jerusalem district, in coop-
eration with Chabad activists, in opening
up Rachel’s Tomb to the public for
extended hours. ❖