PM touts religious pluralism in Christmas greeting
LAST UPDATED: 12/24/2012 18:13
Netanyahu says Christian community in Israel growing, unlike in neighboring countries where they are endangered.
Unlike other countries in the Middle East, where Christian communities are
shrinking and many of them are in danger, in Israel there is a strong and
growing Christian community that participates fully in the life of the country,
Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu said in a taped Christmas greeting on
Monday.
“Israel is proud of its record of religious tolerance and
pluralism, and Israel will continue to protect freedom of religion for all,”
Netanyahu said. “And we will continue to safeguard places of Christian
worship throughout our country.”
In an apparent reference to a spate of
vandalism against Christian sites over the last year, Netanyahu – who has come
out forcefully against such actions – said: “We will not tolerate any acts of
violence or discrimination against any place of worship. This is not our
way, and this is something we cannot accept.”
The prime minister invited
the world’s Christians to “recall the places where Judaism and Christianity
emerged, and then come see our ancient land with your own eyes. Visit Nazareth
and Bethlehem, wade into the Jordan River, stand on the shores of the Sea of
Galilee [Lake Kinneret] and next year come visit our eternal capital of
Jerusalem.”
Netanyahu’s comments about endangered Christian communities
in the Middle East follows by a day a report by the British think tank Civitas
which concluded that “Christianity is in serious danger of being wiped out in
its biblical heartlands because of Islamic oppression.”
According to the
report by Civitas, which the BBC characterized as right-leaning, “Western
politicians and media largely ignore the widespread persecution of Christians in
the Middle East and the wider world because they are afraid they will be accused
of racism.”
According to the report, “between a half and two-thirds of
Christians in the Middle East have left or been killed over the past
century.”
The pace, the report asserts, “is now intensifying with the
rise of militant Islam in countries such as Egypt, Iraq and now, with the civil
war, Syria.”