Nuns say Bethlehem is dying, due to apathy of Christian world

As the Israeli military occupation continues in Bethlehem, the nuns who run the city's 'Caritas Baby Hospital' have launched an appeal to the world. The Elizabethan Sisters of Padua said in a statement: "Bethlehem is dying, due the apathy of the entire Christian world. The destiny of this city is to pay and pay for those that disseminate death. We are all being punished, we live like prisoners, like animals in a cage, fed by the humanitarian organisations. "We are not a city of terrorists, that deserve a continuous, brutal repression. We are a humiliated city, exhausted, reduced to a mortal cage, massacred by a never-ending revenge. "A few days from Christmas, here in Bethlehem we do not know what celebrating means. Misery reigns on our desolate streets, covered in rubbish. From their armoured vehicles, today, yesterday and the day before yesterday, soldiers shout out orders for the curfew. We are forbidden to leave our homes. "We are prisoners. How can we remain indifferent? How can we maintain silence? How can they keep us like slaves, locking us up in our houses like a tomb, preventing us from walking through our own city, forbidding our children to go to school, for such a long time? "A few days before Christmas our best and profound sentiments have been blown away by the cold winds of war, as dead leaves." * In the days before Christmas, Channel Four TV has begun a series of short documentaries each night on life in Bethlehem at 7.55pm.