An artwork dubbed “scar of Bethlehem” by street artist Banksy is displayed in the Walled Off hotel in Bethlehem, December 22, 2019. Photo: REUTERS/Mussa Qawasma.

In 2017, Premiere Christian News reported:

Israel’s occupation of Palestine is behind the exodus of Palestinian Christians from the region, according to a new study.

Research carried out by Dar al-Kalima University in the occupied West Bank town of Beit Jala, concluded that only a small percentage of Christians had left Palestine because of concerns over Muslim religious conservatism.

Explaining the rationale behind the results of the roughly 500 Christians and 500 Muslims interviewed, the study said: “The pressure of Israeli occupation, ongoing constraints, discriminatory policies, arbitrary arrests, confiscation of lands added to the general sense of hopelessness among Palestinian Christians.”

Details of the survey are not available online, so I cannot see the methodology. It was published in a book by Diyar Publisher, edited by Mitri Raheb, who is the founder of Diyar, as well as of Dar al-Kalima College in Bethlehem.

Raheb is not exactly apolitical. He is a member of the Palestinian National Council and the Palestinian Central Council.

He is also a founder of Kairos Palestine, the antisemitic, supersessionist organization that attempts to use Christian theology to justify the idea that Jews have no business living in Israel. The group also calls the Torah a “dead letter.”

Raheb’s own quotes prove that he is an antisemite.

He spoke at a 2010 “Christ at the Checkpoint” conference, where he said that “the Palestinian people … are the continuation of the peoples of the land” and “Israel represents Rome of the Bible, not the people of the land” — meaning that Jews have no connection to the Israel of the Bible, but Palestinians do.

Then he descended into the purely antisemitic and thoroughly debunked Khazar theory: “I’m sure if we were to do a DNA test between David, who was a Bethlehemite, and Jesus, born in Bethlehem, and Mitri, born just across the street from where Jesus was born, I’m sure the DNA will show that there is a trace. While if you put King David, Jesus, and Netanyahu, you will get nothing, because Netanyahu comes from an East European tribe who converted to Judaism in the Middle Ages.”

The head of a college, who has published his own academic papers and books, is a clear antisemite. Why would anyone trust his study that was obviously designed to confirm his hate?

Elder of Ziyon has been blogging about Israel and the Arab world for a really long time now. He also controls the world, but deep down, you already knew that.