This huge banner displayed outside the Franciscan Church of Annunciation (the biggest Church of Middle East and the epicenter of modern Nazareth), is just an indication to the non-friendly atmosphere prevailing between Christians and Muslims in Nazareth. Initially, I thought not to include this post. But, here is a display of such stark intolerance of a religion to another one, too open and too bold to attract the common public and tourists; I thought it would be worth to upload.
Just a few quick statistics....Apart from Jerusalem, the most important Christian sites in Israel are Nazareth and Bethlehem. The central figure of world's biggest religion spent 30 of His 33 year-long earthly life in a village called Nazareth. Obviously, you expect Nazareth to be a Christian town. On the contrary, the largest Israeli-Arab town, Nazareth is 70% Muslim in its composition. You will also be surprised to know that Bethlehem, the Birthplace of Jesus is also not any more a Christian center. A town once used to be a Christian stronghold has just reversed its statistics. Today, 85% of Bethlehem's population is Muslims and the dwindling Christian population owes only a meager share of 10-12%.
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