Reporter's notebook'When we speak about light, we know what darkness is'

After months of Hezbollah rocket attacks, Haifa’s Christians get ready for Christmas

Without the constant threat of war, residents say they can enjoy the reboot of the northern city’s annual Holiday of Holidays celebration, cancelled last year

Reporter at The Times of Israel

  • Girls pose for pictures on a platform as bubbles are sprayed at them near a lit up Christmas tree, Ramadan Lantern, and Hanukkah menorah displayed at the German Colony area in Israel's northern city of Haifa on December 21, 2024. (Ahmad Gharabli / AFP)
    Girls pose for pictures on a platform as bubbles are sprayed at them near a lit up Christmas tree, Ramadan Lantern, and Hanukkah menorah displayed at the German Colony area in Israel's northern city of Haifa on December 21, 2024. (Ahmad Gharabli / AFP)
  • A man gazes at a reindeer in Wadi Nisnas, Haifa on December 17, 2024. (Diana Bletter/Times of Israel)
    A man gazes at a reindeer in Wadi Nisnas, Haifa on December 17, 2024. (Diana Bletter/Times of Israel)
  • George Ogeries stands in front of the house where he grew up in Wadi Nisnas, Haifa on December 17, 2024. (Diana Bletter/Times of Israel)
    George Ogeries stands in front of the house where he grew up in Wadi Nisnas, Haifa on December 17, 2024. (Diana Bletter/Times of Israel)
  • A store display in Haifa on December 17, 2024. (Diana Bletter/Times of Israel)
    A store display in Haifa on December 17, 2024. (Diana Bletter/Times of Israel)

HAIFA — Up and down the hilly streets of Wadi Nisnas, the main Christian neighborhood in Haifa, are Santa Claus statues, reindeer, and colorful twinkling lights.

After more than 14 months of Iran’s proxy Hezbollah launching hundreds of rockets at the northern city, the decorations on display the week before Christmas were heartwarming. Last year, after the terror group began raining projectiles on the north on October 8, 2023, there was little hope that it would be a festive holiday season until the commencement of the 60-day ceasefire on November 27, 2024.

The city of Haifa has about 290,000 residents, a mixture of Jews, Muslims, and Christians. This holiday season, some 16,500 Christian residents seem grateful that they finally had something to celebrate.

This year’s holiday “is very special, especially after the war,” Father Yousef Yakoub of the St. Lucas Maronite Church in Haifa told The Times of Israel. A soft-spoken, yet determined man of faith, he stressed that from his perspective, “Christmas means that God is not forsaking humanity.”

“We know the despair that comes from war and killing,” Yakoub said. “Now, when we speak about light, we know what darkness is.”

Hezbollah’s rocket fire damaged dozens of properties, injured dozens, and killed two people near the city. The 150-year-old stone study hall of a synagogue was also destroyed.

In some ways, this year’s holiday decorations symbolize the resilience of the mixed city.

Father Yousef Yakoub stands in his church, St. Louis Maronite Church in Haifa. (Courtesy)

There were no city-wide festivities last year in respect to the war with Hamas, which began on October 7, 2023, when Hamas-led terrorists invaded southern Israel, brutally murdered some 1,200 people, mostly civilians, and abducted 251 people into the Gaza Strip, amid acts of horrific brutality. Israel believes that 96 hostages from that day remain in Gaza, a figure that includes the bodies of at least 34 captives confirmed dead by the IDF.

But the “Holiday of Holidays” restarted last week on Wednesday. On display were a Christmas tree, a Hanukkah menorah, and a sickle moon and star, symbolizing Christianity, Judaism, and Islam, the three main religions of the city. Behind the display is the landmark Bahá’í World Center, another religion with a strong presence in Haifa, lit up and appearing golden.

The ‘Holiday of Holidays’ display in Haifa with the Baha’i World Center in the background on December 18, 2024. (Reuven Cohen/Haifa Municipality)

The festival, organized by the Haifa Municipality, the Jewish-Arab Center “Beit Hagefen,” and the Wadi Nisnas Residents’ Committee, has been held annually since 1993. There are free street performances, holiday booths and concerts.

“Haifa celebrates the ‘Holiday of Holidays’ festival in unity,” said Arina Dobkin, spokesperson of the Haifa Municipality. “But all the while, we’re keeping the hostages in our prayers, longing for their return.”

Tourists and shoppers have started to return to the city, and business was brisk after months of stagnation due to rocket fire.

“The situation is calm now,” said Shirin Sfarene, who owns the Christmas Bazaar store on Ben Gurion Boulevard. “It was so hard to sit in the house with kids during the war. People can finally go out and live life.”

The Bahai World Center in Haifa on December 18, 2024. (Reuven Cohen/Haifa Municipality)

‘My faith gives me strength’

There are five different churches in Haifa, including Greek Orthodox and Russian Orthodox, Catholic, and Anglican. In August 2023, President Isaac Herzog visited the Stella Maris Church to bring public awareness to the issue of the safety of Israel’s Christian community.

There had been a problematic attempt by Haredi Jews from outside the city to pray at the iconic church. Locals saw them as provocateurs who wanted to intimidate Christians, while the Jewish pilgrims said they wanted to worship outside what they believe is the burial place of the prophet Elijah.

The pilgrims have stopped coming, and the incident seemed like a rare disturbance. Yet it highlighted historic tensions that sometimes simmer in a city where deadly fighting between Jews and Arabs in 1948 led to a massive flight of Arab residents. The city has since become a rare model for harmonious coexistence.

A store’s holiday display. (Diana Bletter/Times of Israel)

On Tuesday, a week before Christmas, Haifa residents talked with this Times of Israel reporter more about pride in their mixed city than problems. In almost every Christian-owned store in the heart of the Christian neighborhood, Wadi Nisnas, were icons and drawings — up year-round and not just for the holiday.

Working in Hummus Al Sham restaurant in Wadi Nisnas, Louis Speta paused for a moment to show this reporter a prayer and a small crucifix that stood near a ketchup bottle behind the stove.

Speta said his grandfather came from Italy, and he was a Roman Catholic.

“My faith gives me strength,” he said.

Christian Abu Shkara, left, pauses in the middle of work at Felafel HaZeknim with Janan Sbaif on December 17, 2024. (Diana Bletter/Times of Israel)

Farther along in Wadi Nisnas — “nisnas” means mongoose in Arabic — is a falafel stand opened in 1950 by George and Najala Afara. According to local legend, Hebrew-speaking customers used to say they were going to have falafel at “Falafel Zkenim,” or “The Old Couple’s Falafel,” and the name stuck.

“We’re in a good reality right now,” said Christian Abu Shkara as he worked in the crowded shop, frying falafel balls. People were now lined up in front of the shop where once they had avoided the city because of the war.  “We hope it will stay good.”

Still, other residents expressed their fear of the future.

“Our celebration is not 100 percent joy,” said one resident who asked not to be named. “With the security and economic situation, it’s about 80%.”

Street scene in Wadi Nisnas on December 17, 2024. (Diana Bletter/Times of Israel)

Getting along

George Ogeries, a Greek Orthodox man who was born and raised in Haifa, mused about his religious connection to Israel.

“The messiah was born in Bethlehem, grew up in Nazareth, and died in Jerusalem,” he said.

He said, “Jews and Christians are from the same religion… The Jews stopped where they stopped, but we continued,” stressing that he tried to get along with his neighbors of all faiths because of his beliefs.

The owner of a store that sells Christmas decorations, who wanted to remain anonymous, shows off his necklace in Haifa on December 17, 2024. (Diana Bletter/Times of Israel)

“Jesus said that if someone strikes us, we turn the other cheek,” he said, paraphrasing a passage in the Gospel of Matthew.

Father Yousef’s church is Maronite, a Middle Eastern stream of Catholicism, and services are conducted in Aramaic and Arabic. Father Yousef grew up in Jish, a Maronite Christian village in the Galilee, after his family was evacuated from Kafr Bir’im near the Lebanese border during the War of Independence.

Residents were promised they could return, and families of the displaced have for decades lobbied to be allowed to reestablish the village.

It has been a “long journey,” Yousef said, to reach “a new dimension of love and forgiveness.”

A man walks in Wadi Nisnas, Haifa, on December 17, 2024. (Diana Bletter/Times of Israel)

“I have Jewish friends and Muslim friends,” he said. “The moment you have friends of different faiths, you understand their anxiety and pain.”

During the Christmas season, he said, the message is that “God still hopes we can be better.”

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