PA Declares Church in Bethlehem to be Unlawful
The Palestinian Authority declared a Baptist Church in Bethlehem to be unlawful and said that it will no longer receive rights as a religious institution, Algemeiner reported.This decision comes a week after Prime Minister Salam Fayyad told an audience of Evangelical Protestants that his government respected the rights of its Christian minorities.“They said that our legitimacy as a church from a governmental point of view is not approved,” said an assistant pastor at the First Baptist Church. “They said they will not recognize any legal paper work from our church. That includes birth certificates, wedding certificates and death certificates. Children are not even considered to be legitimate if they don’t have recognized paperwork.”FULL STORY at