Tuesday 11 November 2014 Anthony Habash Holyland Christian Ecumenical Foundation

We visited Anthony Habash in Bethlehem.  He is director of the Holy Land Christian Ecumenical Foundation. Palestinians tend to blame Israel for all of their problems, but he said Palestinians need to get their own house in order.  He believes peace will come from grass roots, not from governments.

Whenever they do a project, they try to get the beneficiaries to contribute something toward the project.  He believes a complete handout is not helpful. They run a hotel with 27 rooms as part of their foundation. They primarily host pilgrims who come to Bethlehem. The hotel is within a short walk to Manger Square.  They generate earnings from the hotel that will be used to offset some of the Foundation's overhead.  Donors typically don't want to donate for overhead items, so this is a way they can run the foundation without asking for money from donors to cover overhead.  This is similar to the concept expressed by Kol Ha Isha, an Israeli non-profit we work with in Jerusalem.

Palestinians believe they won't be heard if they try to correct the situation with Israel.  Someone recently started a petition for the Israeli court to hear a case about land the Israelis confiscated.  His family land was confiscated and is now the site of an Israeli settlement. They expected to get thousands of signatures, but they got only 23.  His father didn't sign, saying it was futile to expect anything would be done about it.