The Pope's visit to Aida refugee camp

As I watched The Ten O'Clock News last night a story came on about the Pope's visit to the West Bank. I paid particular attention to the section regarding his visit to Aida refugee camp in Bethlehem, as it was a place I'd visited myself just a few weeks earlier.

We were able to meet a Palestinian family living in Aida and hear some of their story. The father told us about life in the camp and we heard a harrowing account of a young boy being shot dead from a watch tower and of the violence during the second Intifada.

He also told us about the giant key, which has been made and now sits above the main gate into the camp. For Palestinian refugees, the key represents the right to return to their homes, which they fled during the 1948 war. He showed us the stage, which was being erected for the Pope's visit and the route he would take.

When I saw the news story, I thought of this family with whom I'd become friends and so I decided to email him to ask what he made of the Pope's visit. I've copied his response below, but left out his name for security.

Hi Joff, It's good to hear from you again.

Yes the Pope's visit was so exiting for all of us here in Aida. The ceremony went well and we presented him with two gifts specially made for his Holiness. The first was embroidered shawl. On it was embroidered symbols from Palestine, religious and non-religious. The second was engraved stone which we brought from Typrese Galili Sea.

We presented a Dabka show (a Folkloric dance) from our kids. Also our kids scouts marched in front of the Pope before entering the school on the beats of the drums. President Abbas and PM Fayyad was here too for the reception.

I think what the Pope said in his speech was great and his remarks on the homeless Palestinians and their sufferings are well received here, even if it was a little but ambiguous as it didn't mention the right of return but still we got what we wanted to hear. Also his remarks were made while sitting in front the wall, which was good. He said it brought the stalemate of the situation as it is now because of this wall. But his remarks afterwards in the President's Palace was the symbol and the highlight of our achievements in His Holines visit. He said he was disgusted with the presence of the wall and was deeply moved by the suffering of the Palestinian families. This is great for us.

He also donated 70,000 Euro's for building new classrooms for our schools in the camp, and we thanked him for that. We gave him two letters. One from our people in the camp, thanking him for choosing our camp for his visit and the other asking him to intervene to stop the misery of the deportees of the Church Of Nativity siege. We asked him to intervene to the Israeli government to allow those deportees to come back home. I have attached the camps letter for you to read. I will send you more photos of His Holiness visit next time.
The Israelis were very furious at the Pope for visiting us and sitting in front the Wall where tens of media were broadcasting live images of the Wall. I gave a few interviews with media and some of the journalists said that there was not enough clapping of hands during the Pope's speech. I explained that the translation was so weak and volume so low and also because people were overwhelmed by the presence of The Pope and President Abbas and PM Fayyad, so they weren't sure what to do especially with presence of so many security forces. We were told so many things that we were not allowed do by the security forces and secret service during the visit so we were unsure and overwhelmed. We greeted the pope with the clapping but some media said it wasn't good enough.

I hope to hear from you soon.
Regards