Faith leaders and residents in Bethlehem are grappling with how to mark the festive holiday while fellow Palestinians continue to be killed.

The city of Bethlehem in the Israeli-occupied West Bank, the traditional birthplace of Jesus, will not have the usual trappings of the city's favorite holiday: no public Christmas tree, no raucous scouts march,

BETHLEHEM, West Bank (AP) — Bethlehem prepared Tuesday to mark another somber Christmas in the traditional birthplace of Jesus under the shadow of war in Gaza.

For the second consecutive year, the city of Bethlehem in the southern West Bank is commemorating Christmas this year without the usual festive displays, mourning for Gaza amidst the ongoing Israeli genocide that has persisted for nearly 15 months.

Some say that the community is in danger of losing its 1,600-year foothold in the enclave and that it is far from certain those who have fled will ever feel safe enough to return home.

As Christmas arrives, the small Christian community in the Gaza Strip is again facing a season mired in war. Once a time marked by family gatherings, decorations and liturgies, the holiday this year will be spent in makeshift shelters in partially destroyed churches standing amid the ruins of a war-torn enclave.

In most years, by this time, the celebrations of the glorious holidays have long been underway in Gaza. The Gaza Strip is a small area inhabited by 2,300,000 citizens, between 1,000 and 1,300 of them Christians who live in safety and peace among the Muslim majority.