We visited the Church of the Nativity, where Jesus was supposedly born, St. Catherine's Church, which is physically connected to the Church of the Nativity, and the Church of the Milk Grotto.
While Bethlehem is a lovely town, an unfortunate occurrence is that many people are educated and have college degrees, but due to politics, the lack of opportunities in the local economy, and travel restrictions to other countries, they often end up working in tourism to survive.
For example, we spoke with a shopkeeper whose two brothers had gone to America some 15 years before. He himself had had a scholarship to study surgery in the US, but he chose not to go; the Israeli government wanted him to sign a document saying that if he moved to the United States, he could never again live in Bethlehem. His two brothers, who are successful and now have US citizenship, can return to Bethlehem only to visit.
Another shopkeeper was also kind enough to show us his travel document, which looks like a passport but is technically not one, since Palestine isn't an internationally recognized state.
Towards the end of our trip, we visited the separation barrier/wall/fence (different people call it different things, depending on their politics; I'll let you decide what you want to call it). A famous British graffiti artist named Banksy has visited the wall and painted whimsical, political murals on it. Local artists also frequent the separation barrier/wall/fence.
In Arabic, "Beit Lehem" means "House of Flesh/Meat." In Hebrew, "Bayit Lekhem" means "House of Bread."
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