One thing which is missing from the stereotype of Palestinians is that they are all Muslim. Not at all. This is the Holy Land: sacred to Jews, Christians, and Muslims. Bethlehem is on the West Bank and is part of Palestine. Palestine is the home of early Christianity, as is Gaza.
As of 2015, Palestinian Christians comprise approximately 1–2.5% of the
population of the West Bank, and less than 1% in the Gaza Strip.
According to official British Mandatory estimates, Palestine's Christian
population in 1922 constituted 9.5% of the total Mandatory Palestine
population (10.8% of the Palestinian Arab population), and 7.9% in 1946.
A large number of Arab Christians fled or were expelled from the
Jewish-controlled areas of Mandatory Palestine during the 1948
Arab–Israeli War, and a small number left during the period (1948–1967)
of Jordanian control of the West Bank for economic reasons.[citation
needed] From 1967, during the Israeli military rule, the Palestinian
Christian population has increased while as a percentage of the
population continued to decrease.
There are also many Palestinian
Christians who are descendants of Palestinian refugees from the
post-1948 era who fled to Christian-majority countries and formed large
diaspora Christian communities. Worldwide, there are nearly one million
Palestinian Christians in these territories as well as in the
Palestinian diaspora, comprising around 6–7% of the world's total
Palestinian population. Palestinian Christians live primarily in Arab
states surrounding historic Palestine and in the diaspora, particularly
in Europe and the Americas.
See also:
- Palestinian Christians and Muslims have lived together in the region for centuries − and several were killed recently while sheltering in the historic Church of Saint Porphyrius
- Gaza’s Christians fear ‘threat of extinction’ amid Israel war
- Israel-Palestine war: A quick history of Christianity in Gaza
- Palestine and its religious importance
