There’s a recent star within the constellation of Bethlehem, Jesus’ birthplace: an inn with a purpose beyond mere hospitality.
The newest boutique hotel to open its doors in Bethlehem’s Old City, just minutes away from Manger Square, is the Morcos Nassar Palace, which doubles as a humanitarian project unique in Palestine and possibly within the Arab world.
The ornate structure was built between 1899 and 1910 as a family mansion by Paris-trained architect Morcos Nassar, a native son who died in 1936. Like many other local families, Nassar’s descendants fled the region after the war of 1948, to be dispersed around the globe.
The newest boutique hotel to open its doors in Bethlehem’s Old City is the Morcos Nassar Palace, which doubles as a humanitarian project unique in Palestine and possibly within the Arab world.
The house modified hands quite a few times, ending up in 2013, in some disrepair, because the office space for L’Arche, known locally as Ma’an lil-Hayat, “Together for Life.” The Bethlehem program is a component of the international federation of L’Arche communities where individuals with and without mental disabilities live and work together.
Even before the hotel opened, L’Arche Bethlehem was singular for offering a productive and protected structure for disabled Palestinians. Ma’an lil-Hayat is understood for the craft goods its members make from local wool sourced from Palestinian shepherds and, more recently, for its leatherwork.
Ma’an lil-Hayat’s director, Mahera Nassar Ghareeb—no relation to the palace’s original owner—noted that in Palestine there is no such thing as a support structure specifically for families with intellectually disabled members. “In the event that they don’t come to Ma’an lil-Hayat, they’re locked in at home watching TV or running around on the streets,” she said, adding that disabled people in Palestine still face social stigma, though that’s being mitigated with the growing awareness of the dignity of intellectually disabled those that is advocated by her organization.
It was Ms. Nassar Ghareeb who looked up at her dilapidated surroundings about eight years ago, saw the magnificence lying just beneath its surface, and thought: “This shouldn’t be our workshop. This masterpiece needs to be shared with the world.”
Thus a recent mission was born—to show the rundown palace right into a boutique hotel that might draw visitors from all 4 corners of the world and showcase Palestinian society while offering a way of purpose and, crucially for her, visibility, to the Palestinians with disabilities who would staff the establishment.
In Palestine there is no such thing as a support structure specifically for families with intellectually disabled members. “In the event that they don’t come to Ma’an lil-Hayat, they’re locked in at home watching TV or running around on the streets.”
After a soft opening over the summer, the Morcos Nassar Palace’s 12 rooms were at full capability by mid-November, staffed by 4 fully abled professionals and three of Ma’an lil-Hayat’s “core members,” including the hotel chef, who’s a deaf and mute person.
The opposite L’Arche members handle room cleansing, breakfast service and clearing tables. One core member handles the gardening.
The reception desk, logistics and most guest interactions are handled by members of the fully abled staff. The hotel goals to draw pilgrims who seek a more meaningful interaction with Bethlehem and its people than what they may experience in the standard one-hour stop on the Church of the Nativity, and visitors in search of a deeper experience of Bethlehem’s heritage and culture.
To realize her goal, Ms. Nassar Ghareeb brought together the Palestinian Center for Cultural Heritage Preservation and Albergo Etico, an Italian organization that supports the creation of employment opportunities for young individuals with mental disabilities. To make the project sustainable and energy-wise, she brought in BEEP, the European Energy Efficiency Project. Bethlehem University’s business school accepted the challenge of making a successful nonprofit hospitality enterprise in its incubator program.
The constructing’s painstaking overhaul, led by Italian artisans, took several years to finish, the work delayed by the Covid-19 pandemic.
After that travail, nevertheless, the result’s a stunner.
The hotel’s floors, all made up of the villa’s original decoratively tinted tiles, shine. The dining room’s windows open onto a panoramic view of the semi-arid Biblical slopes that opened up around Bethlehem, and its partitions are adorned with a meticulously restored trompe l’oeil fresco of a colonnade.
Thus a recent mission was born—to show the rundown palace right into a boutique hotel that might draw visitors from all 4 corners of the world while offering a way of purpose and visibility to Palestinians with disabilities.
An elevator has been added to the constructing to adapt to modern accessibility requirements.
Morcos Nassar’s lush gardens are actually open to hotel guests, who sometimes sneak an orange off the trees.
Despite continuing worries of possible unrest erupting within the West Bank, and fears that the Covid-19 tourism collapse would persist into 2023, pilgrims—mostly Christians from the Americas—returned to Bethlehem as soon as pandemic restrictions were lifted.
Tourism in Bethlehem, a gem of a city on the Judean hills, has also been buoyed by the overflow from overbooked hotels in neighboring Jerusalem and a successful ad campaign that promoted Bethlehem’s many prosaic attractions, which include 1000’s of years of history, winding alleyways, wonderful local cuisine and its wild, native beauty.
So far, Ms. Nassar Ghareeb said, there have been “no stumbles” on the boutique hotel. She said the brand new employees “are very glad at their jobs, very pleased with what they’re doing.”
Between July, when the hotel first opened to the general public, and October, there was a gentle flow of guests, with as much as eight of the hotel’s dozen rooms taken, but November brought a spike in occupancy. “Once we opened it we didn’t expect that the entire world would have an interest, or coming here,” she said.
Morcos Nassar’s lush gardens are actually open to hotel guests, who sometimes sneak an orange off the trees.
Initial reviews on Booking.com are universally positive, with the hotel scoring 9.5 out of 10. In a review that typified others, Val from the UK wrote: “That is among the best hotels we’ve stayed in. Our room was beautiful…. Nevertheless, our biggest praise must go to the staff. They couldn’t do enough for us. What an exquisite team.”
The hotel was formally inaugurated on a breezy mid-June afternoon, with a rousing performance of the Palestinian national anthem and something of a hospitality rehearsal, with L’Arche members greeting an audience of members of the family and foreign emissaries, smilingly circulating with trays of finger food.
Palestinian Minister of Culture Atef Abu Saif, who attended the event together with his young daughter, noted that Bethlehem has at all times been on the vanguard, a city of consequential affairs.
“The birth of Jesus Christ is an important event that took place here in Bethlehem and made this humble town famous worldwide. Nevertheless it shouldn’t be the one event of significance. We now have very wealthy cultural resources, one among them being these historic palaces.”
Bethlehem is home to about a dozen palatial homes which have, over time, been transformed to numerous public uses. Acknowledging the Morcos Nassar Palace’s distinction—“it’s unique in Palestine, I don’t know concerning the whole Arab world”— Mr. Abu Saif looked as if he were near bursting with pride.
“At this inauguration, yes, I feel very proud,” he said, “pleased with being a part of this necessary project to serve the community. It shouldn’t be the story of a restoration, of how we preserved the constructing, or adapted it for its current use. It’s the story of how we opened it up for the worldwide community, which is the hope of our kids.”