Lockdown in Bethlehem Keeps Residents Confined to Homes Military Refuses to Allow Ambulances to Collect Dead, Wounded
by Keith B. Richburg, Washington Post Foreign S
Wednesday April 03, 2002 at 04:05 PM

BETHLEHEM, April 3 – In the wake of the Israeli army's predawn Tuesday invasion, demolished cars lined the narrow hillside streets of this city today, shops had their shutters ripped away, and the dead shared space with the wounded as a military clampdown kept frightened residents locked in their homes.

In one small house, in Bethlehem's Old City, a woman named Fatheyeh Mousa was wailing at foreign reporters for help in getting a dead man's body removed from her kitchen. She didn't know the man – he was from a Palestinian refugee camp in Jordan, he told her. He was wounded during the early hours of the Israeli incursion, and the woman's family had taken him in and provided shelter. Since no ambulances were allowed on the streets, he died on a thin mat on her kitchen floor.

"He kept bleeding. We tried to find any kind of medicine to help him, but he had a hole in his waist," the woman cried, as a child of about four stood transfixed by the feet of the corpse in the kitchen. "We didn't know who he was, but we feel like he was family already. . . . I feel like I lost a member of my family."

The man, who told the family his name was Abdel Khader Abu Ahmad, died from his wounds just a few hours before the reporters arrived at the house.

Nearby, in a small mosque, the body of another man, apparently a fighter, lay partially covered under a green coat and a colorful striped blanket. The man had been wounded, and someone tried to give him first aid, apparent from the blood-stained bandages over his right arm.

The military's refusal to allow ambulances to collect the dead and wounded has drawn sharp complaints and cries of outrage from Bethlehem's residents, including medical workers and clergymen. One ambulance was allowed out for about a half an hour this afternoon, under an agreement negotiated between the Israeli military and the Red Crescent Society. The driver, Jamal Balboul, picked up three dead bodies and two wounded people – and with no room in the back, he stacked the dead in first, and put the two injured people on top.

"It's unimaginable," said the Rev. Maroun Lahham, rector of the Latin Seminary of Bethlehem. "Even in the worst of wars, the Red Cross was always allowed to come and help people."

Lahham said many people around the world were concerned with the fate of Bethlehem's Church of the Nativity, built on the spot where Jesus is believed to have been born, and where tonight 200 or so Palestinian militiamen remained sheltered, surrounded by a ring of Israeli tanks and troops outside. But Lahham said he was more concerned about those injured in the city who were being prevented from getting medical attention.

"For me, the dignity of human beings is even more important," he said. "People are bleeding to death. This is more important than the Basilica of the Nativity."

Peter Qumri, director of the nearby Beit Jala hospital, said he believed about nine people were killed during the initial Israeli assault on the town, and five others died today. He said it was impossible to get an accurate count of the wounded while the city remained under a curfew.

An Israeli army spokesman said the current policy was to restrict the movement of ambulances around Manger Square, where the Church of the Nativity is located, and the approach roads because of ongoing sniper fire. "But as soon as they can go, they go," he said. He also said Palestinian ambulances were being stopped and checked because in the past they were discovered to be ferrying weapons. Before the Passover holiday, he said, an ambulance carrying a three-year-old boy was stopped, and soldiers discovered a belt of explosives hidden underneath the stretcher.

The streets of this picturesque town showed the extent of the devastation caused during that initial Israeli push into the city. Dozens of cars are smashed along Farahieh Street, one of the main roads leading into the Old City, apparently crushed by tanks as they wound their way through the narrow passageways.

The turquoise shutters across many of the shops had been ripped away, as soldiers were apparently searching the buildings, for weapons or hidden gunmen.

Pope Paul VI Street was deserted of people, and littered with debris. The only noise was the mournful wail of a burglar alarm at a pharmacy. Palestinians had apparently tried to erect some makeshift barricades of metal and tires, which were no match for the tanks and armored vehicles that rolled over them. At several points, water rushed onto the street from burst water pipes.

Much of the focus today was on the Church of the Nativity, where 200 people, mostly "tanzim" militiamen from the Al Aqsa Brigade, were holed up. Father Parthenius, a Canadian Greek Orthodox priest inside, said the militiamen were frightened, but were respectful of the church and the clergy. He said many of the fighters were Christians and joined in the several masses held there each day. Several wounded militiamen had been treated on the scene.

The fighters were sleeping in the church's large Basilica. The biggest problem was the lack of food for the fighters. He said they were surviving on tea and biscuits.

"They're carrying their own weapons," he said. "But I think they are out of ammunition." He said the militiamen never tried to fire from the church, which would be impossible anyway since there are no windows in the closed structure.

Even as negotiations continued, he said he was unsure what might end the standoff. "To tell you the truth, we don't know what they want," he said. "I will never ask them to leave. It's up to them."