Low-Frequency Warfare Against Jerusalem Christians

The October 7, 2023, attack and the conflagration that followed in the Middle East tend to obscure the threats weighing on Jerusalem's Christian communities. A low-key effort to systematically Judaize East Jerusalem - the historic part of the Holy City - has been underway for several years, whether by religious parties or by the municipality itself.

The latest incident: the non-payment of a municipal tax called "arnona," an annual tax to which the occupants of real estate are subject, whether they are tenants or owners, individuals or merchants. The origin of this name comes from Aramaic, a language in which this word designated a tax applied to agricultural production.

This tax, which in the biblical world designated a tax on agricultural production, was established in 1934 during the British mandate by an ordinance relating to municipalities. Adopted in its English version by the State of Israel when it was created in 1948, this ordinance would be replaced in 1964 by the law relating to municipalities, written in the Hebrew language.

In February 2025, the Jerusalem city hall issued an order to confiscate properties belonging to the Patriarchate to recover “astronomical” sums, dating back to 1994. The Patriarchate vigorously contests this debt, which has not been clearly justified. The amount owed has been exaggerated and includes taxes on certain properties that should be exempt.

On February 18, the Christian denominations of the Holy City published a joint protest addressed to Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu: “It is inconceivable that Christian institutions, whose mission for centuries has been to keep the faith, serve communities and preserve the sacred heritage of the Holy Sepulcher, should face the threat of confiscation of property on the basis of measures that ignore the right to a fair trial.”

The court hearing scheduled for February 24, 2025, to examine a request from the Patriarchate to block this seizure has been postponed indefinitely. Without a favorable decision, these assets risk being sold at auction, which the representatives of the Christian Churches describe as “legally dubious and morally unacceptable.”

Cardinal Pierbattista Pizzaballa, the Latin Patriarch of Jerusalem, who has a strong influence in the Holy Land, has joined this initiative, because Catholics are also in the crosshairs of ultra-Orthodox Jews, who are one of the linchpins of the current Israeli government. This affair in fact revives an older struggle over the imposition of taxes.

For centuries, the Churches of Jerusalem have benefited from tax exemptions inherited from the Ottoman era. In recent years, the municipality has attempted to tax non-religious properties (schools, hospices, etc.), a measure that Christian communities oppose as an attack on their financial autonomy and their mission.

The Armenian Patriarchate is also facing controversial real estate transactions. In 2021, officials sold Armenian property in order to build a luxury hotel. The Patriarchate canceled the agreement in 2023, denouncing irregularities, but the continuation of the work has led to clashes with the Armenian community and police interventions.

In their statement, the leaders of the Christian communities intend to raise awareness of a policy that could set a dangerous precedent for all Christian institutions, further weakening a community already reduced to 1-2% of the population:

“Targeting a Church is an attack on all, and we cannot remain silent while the foundations of our Christian witness in the land of Christ are shaken,” they denounce.

It remains to be seen how much weight the protests of the Christians of Jerusalem, considered as second-class Israeli citizens, will carry, while the spotlight remains on the fate of the Israeli hostages held in the Gaza Strip, and on the future of the fragile ceasefire signed between the Jewish state and the Islamists.