Jerusalem, Dec. 24, (dpa/GNA) – Sombre Christmas celebrations were to start in the Biblical birthplace of Jesus on Thursday, with not only inns, but also Manger Square, void of pilgrims due to a coronavirus travel ban on foreign nationals.
“There has been no incoming tourism to Israel [and the occupied West Bank] since the decision to close Israel’s skies to foreign nationals in March,” Tourism Ministry spokeswoman Lydia Weitzman told dpa – a stark contrast to the tens of thousands of Christian pilgrims and tourists who visited during the Christmas period in previous years.
Latin Patriarch Pierbattista Pizzaballa was scheduled to lead the traditional Christmas procession from Jerusalem to the autonomous Palestinian city of Bethlehem, located in the West Bank to Jerusalem’s immediate south.
He was scheduled to leave the Old City of Jerusalem’s Christian Quarter at 0930 GMT, heading to a monastery on the road to Bethlehem, after which he would pass through the Israeli-built concrete “security” wall into the Biblical town.
He was expected to arrive at Manger Square at 1200 GMT, where Pizzaballa, the head of the Roman Catholic Church in the Holy land, was to celebrate the midnight mass in the Church of the Nativity, built on the traditional site of Jesus’ birth, in the presence of clergy only.
The West Bank has been under curfew, with no one allowed out their homes from 7 pm (1700 GMT) until 6 am (0400 GMT) each night for the past weeks, in a bid to curb the spread of the novel coronavirus.
GNA