Will Gaza's Palestinian Christian community survive Israel's war?

Israel’s war on the Gaza Strip, which has so far killed more than 23,000 Palestinians, mostly women and children, and displaced some 1.9 million people, is endangering the very existence of Gaza's small Christian community.

On 16 December, Israeli forces directly targeted the compound of the Church of the Holy Family, the only Catholic church in Gaza, where Palestinian Christians and others were desperately seeking safety.

Nahida Anton and her daughter Samar were shot dead by an Israeli sniper within church grounds after they walked outside. Israel’s army claimed there was a rocket launcher in the church, but the Latin Patriarchate of Jerusalem said that Israel shot them in “cold blood”.

Earlier the same day, the Sisters of Mother Teresa convent, which is part of the church compound, was struck three times by Israeli artillery shells rendering the monastery uninhabitable, according to the Latin Patriarchate.

 "I'm afraid the last chapter of Christianity in Gaza is being written"

“My family is sheltering in the Holy Family church, not from Hamas, but from Israeli airstrikes that murdered my cousin at St. Porphyrius,” Hammam Farah, a Palestinian Christian from Gaza, wrote on X in December. Some of his relatives were killed by Israeli fire, among them his great aunt Elham who was shot by a sniper in November and left to bleed to death.

In another post, Farah shared a message received by his mother describing the horrible situation at the only Catholic Church in Gaza, where some Christians sought refuge when the war started. “Israeli tanks have surrounded the church, and snipers have taken position around it, shooting at the oldest Christian community in the world,” he wrote.

Back on 19 October, an Israeli airstrike hit the Greek Orthodox Saint Porphyrius Church in Gaza City (the third oldest church in the world) which was providing shelter to many displaced families, killing at least 18 Christians and wounding several people while causing severe damage to the church. 

A Christian man, Shukri Al Souri, died at the Holy Family Church while he was mourning the loss of his brothers and several other family members in the bombing of St. Porphyrius.

“A Palestinian Christian family has been erased from the civil registry. When advocates say that Palestinian Christians in Gaza are at risk of elimination due to Israel's aggression, they are not exaggerating,” Mai El-Sadany, a human rights lawyer focusing on the MENA region, posted on X.

Mitri Raheb, a Palestinian Lutheran pastor and founder of Dar al-Kalima University in Bethlehem, said that about 3% of Gaza’s Christian residents have been killed by airstrikes and shooting attacks by Israel since the beginning of the war.

“Almost all Christian institutions in Gaza have suffered either destruction or damage, Christians have lost their homes and businesses,” the Lutheran leader told The New Arab.

“Israel’s targeting of churches is intended to send a message that there’s no safe place in Gaza, including for Christians who have found shelter in religious buildings,” Rifat Kassis, general coordinator of Kairos Palestine and Global Kairos for Justice, told The New Arab.

Discussing the impact of such direct attacks on the small minority, he argued that a gradual obliteration of the Christian presence in Gaza would “feed the Israeli propaganda” which claims Christians are persecuted by Hamas.

In his view, the Christian community also poses a problem for Israel because their voice is generally heard outside of Palestine, given their established relations with global church institutions and the West overall.

“Israel sees our potential to convey abroad the right picture of the situation here, which is about occupation and apartheid, not a religious conflict,” the Palestinian Christian activist carefully specified. “We side with our Muslim brothers and sisters as Palestinians at large.”

"This could be one of the biggest blows for the community, we might not see any Christians after this war"

Since Israel embarked on its massive military campaign on Gaza on 7 October, it has bombarded a number of churches where Palestinians – Christian and Muslim – were taking refuge.

Gaza’s only Baptist church was severely damaged by an Israeli tank shell a day after Christmas. The Byzantine church in Jabalia, in northern Gaza, was completely destroyed during Israel's relentless assault there, along with the Green Shrine in Deir Al-Balah in the centre of the enclave, the first Christian monastery built in Palestine during the Byzantine era, which was partially damaged.

Al-Ahli Hospital, the only Christian hospital in the Gaza Strip, which is run by the Anglican church, was also severely damaged by Israeli missile fire in a devastating explosion on 17 October that killed hundreds. The hospital had suffered damage from another Israeli missile three days before the deadly blast.

Christians make up a tiny percentage of the population in Gaza with less than 1,000 residents. Half are indigenous to Gaza and half are refugees or descendants of refugees from Jaffa, Jerusalem, Lydda, and Ramle, according to Raheb.

The territory is home to one of the oldest Christian communities in the world, dating back to the first century, the majority of whom are Greek Orthodox while a much smaller percentage are Roman Catholics, Baptists, and other Protestant denominations.

Their number has dwindled in recent years as a result of the ongoing blockade, imposed by Israel in 2007 after Hamas took control of Gaza, which led to large-scale migration. The community has dramatically dropped from an estimated 3,500 Christians at the time the blockade was imposed.

Israel’s current war, the deadliest ever, combined with harsh living conditions under siege will predictably push many more of them to flee.

“The general thought among all Palestinian Christians now is to immigrate, after their homes and businesses were destroyed, and since there is no political horizon signalling an end to this crisis,” a Greek Orthodox Christian banker from Gaza City who was forced to leave his 50-year-old family-run business told +972 magazine.

In light of the attacks by the Israeli army on churches and community members since 7 October, the Palestinian Christian human rights initiative Balasan addressed an urgent appeal in November to UN Special Procedures to respond to the imminent threats to the presence of Christian communities in the occupied Palestinian territories, including the Gaza Strip.

In a statement on Christmas Day, Al Mezan Center for Human Rights wholeheartedly denounced Israel’s deliberate targeting of Palestinian Christians and their places of worship in Gaza, highlighting that it is aimed at “erasing Palestinian history and culture in Gaza”.

“Christians are targeted because they are Palestinians. It’s a nation under attack by Israel,” Xavier Abu Eid, political scientist and author of ‘Rooted in Palestine: Palestinian Christians and the Struggle for National Liberation 1917-2004’, told TNA. He emphasised that the plight of Christians in Palestine, at risk of eradication, needs to be discussed in the context of the 75-year-old Nakba that saw the forced displacement of three-quarters of the Palestinian people.

"Christians are targeted because they are Palestinians. It's a nation under attack by Israel"

The Palestinian author, who was born to a Christian family from Beit Jala, pointed out how many among Gaza’s Christians have shown “resilience” in choosing to continue living in the coastal enclave. This is in the face of Israel’s frequent military attacks and its closure policy blocking Gaza residents from going to the West Bank, which was introduced after Hamas’ takeover of Gaza in 2007.

“Gazans are being denied their right to study or work in their own homeland 80km away,” Abu Eid noted.

Warning about the disappearance of Christian Gazans, the political observer slammed Western powers for their inability to stop the attacks on churches and religious sites amid Israel’s ongoing war against Palestinians. “We’re witnessing a catastrophic situation, nobody can say Israel did not make clear statements about its intention to push our people out of Gaza,” he said.

Kassis also voiced serious concern about the fate of Gaza’s shrinking religious minority. “This could be one of the biggest blows for the community, we might not see any Christians after this war,” he said.

Israel’s devastating and indiscriminate war along with the ongoing blockade threaten the very existence of Christians in the Gaza Strip for the first time in their 2000-year history.

 “I’m afraid the last chapter of Christianity in Gaza is being written,” Palestinian Lutheran pastor Mitri Raheb said.

Alessandra Bajec is a freelance journalist currently based in Tunis.

Follow her on Twitter: @AlessandraBajec