April 28, 1999

Land feud threat to Nazareth's interfaith peace
___By Elaine Ruth Fletcher
___Religion News Service
___NAZARETH, Israel (RNS) --As the call for afternoon prayers is heard, 100 Muslims, including jeans-clad young men and elderly sheikhs, gather in a makeshift tent to pray in the shadow of the tomb of Shihab-a-Din, a 12th-century Muslim hero who fought to expel the Crusaders from the Holy Land.
___These men, members of the Shihab-a-Din Muslim Wakf (Trust), are waging their own modern-day battle to gain control of this one-half-acre plot of land in the heart of downtown Nazareth's tourist district.
___Their goal is to construct a large mosque alongside one of Christendom's most renowned holy sites--the Basilica of the Annunciation, built over the site where tradition holds the Angel Gabriel told Mary she would give birth to Jesus.
___Simmering

PALESTINIANSpass on the other side of the road from an Israeli border policeman.

Christian-Muslim tensions over that goal suddenly erupted Easter Sunday (April 4) in violent street disturbances that left several dozen residents injured and damaged homes and cars.
___The dispute also has already claimed one high-ranking Israeli official.
___Avi Blustein, director general of Israel's Religious Affairs Ministry, was stripped of his authority April 14 after he said mosque construction would lead to a shutdown of churches across Israel during the year 2000, when the Jewish state hopes large numbers of Christian pilgrims--including Pope John Paul II--will visit.
___Eli Suissa, the minister for religious affairs and Blustein's boss, said Blustein's comments harmed efforts to find a compromise solution to the dispute.
___Roman Catholic officials in Jerusalem said Blustein had overstated the situation. Wadie Abu Nasr, a spokesman for the Latin Patriarch of Jerusalem, said churches in Nazareth only--not all of Israel--would close in 2000 only if there were further violence, not if a mosque is constructed.
___In Nazareth, meanwhile, preparations for the millennium have stalled. International investors have frozen plans to create a large amphitheater on the fringes of the city to accommodate a public appearance by the pope before an expected crowd of thousands.
___In addition, a much smaller plaza planned for the disputed plot next to the basilica--and which would serve as an official reception site--has become entangled in a court battle that has dragged on for more than a year, frustrating those on both sides of the religious divide.
___Currently registered as Israeli state land, Muslims erected the tent-mosque on the disputed site in December 1997, maintaining the plot is an Islamic holy place that rightfully belongs to the Shihab-a-Din Muslim Wakf.
___The dispute has rippled across Israel's northern Galilee, souring Christian-Muslim coexistence in a region where Christian Arabs are already a minority, outnumbered and outflanked by rapidly growing Muslim and Jewish communities.
___In Nazareth proper, where Christians now comprise less than 40 percent of the population, churches were closed for two days in protest after the Easter Sunday riot.
___Israeli authorities have sought to paint the dispute purely as a power struggle between the more westernized Christian Arab elite and an increasingly assertive Muslim community. But Nazareth Arabs also point the finger of blame at the national government.
___These critics say Israel's

MUSLIM ACTIVISTS Sammer Abu Ahmed (left) and Ali Abu Ahmed stand in front of a Muslim prayer tent erected in a land dispute with Nazareth Christians. Behind them rises the Church of the Annunciation, where tradition says the birth of Jesus was announced to Mary. (RNS/Reuters)

hardline Likud party, headed by Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, has played politics with the squabble, allowing it to fester.
___Now, as Israel's May 17 general elections approach, Tourism Minister Moshe Katsav, a close Netanyahu associate, has offered a compromise plan to build a small mosque on a portion of the disputed site. That plan has been rejected by the Shihab-a-Din group.
___"Politics got into the picture, especially because of the coming elections," said Lutfi Mash'our, editor of the mainstream Nazareth weekly A-Sinaara. "There are plenty of Israeli politicians who believe that a fight between the Arabs is good for the Jews.
___"What's happening between Muslims and Christians here is happening in an (Israeli) pressure cooker of discrimination and disadvantage. Muslims and Christians here have a lot of common problems and instead of working together, they are now fighting each other."
___Right-wing Israeli politicians and Islamic groups have long had a common enemy in the sort of leftist, secular Palestinian Arab parties that, until recently, held sway in Nazareth. That common interest always has been an active factor in Israeli politics.
___"All of the members of the Israeli right have come to visit the protest tent," said Atef Al Fahoum, a trustee of Nazareth's White Mosque and scion of a prominent local Muslim family.
___Al Fahoum, 69, sees Islam as a philosophy of love and moderation, and dislikes the plans and tactics of the younger Islamic militants involved in the Shihab-a-Din protest.
___But he also is convinced the government has egged them on.
___"I believe what is happening in Nazareth is connected to the dirty policy of our state," he said. "Netanyahu has promised to give them the land to build whatever they want, a mosque, in exchange for their votes in the upcoming elections."
___"This problematic issue should have been solved a long time ago by the government," said Nasser, the spokesman for Jerusalem's Latin Patriarch Michel Sabbah, the Holy Land's top Catholic official. "We are more concerned about the relationship of the Christians and Muslims in Nazareth than about whether a mosque is built or not."
___Motti Zaken, Netanyahu's adviser for Arab affairs, called the charges of politicking "nonsense." He insisted the government has been stymied in its search for a compromise that "would be agreeable to both sides and not too painful for either one."
___Zaken said Muslim interests concerning the property have to be addressed, particularly since Muslim politicians aligned with the Shihab-a-Din group now hold a majority of Nazareth city council seats.
___

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