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American Morning

In Bethlehem, About 200 People Holed Up Inside Church of the Nativity

Aired April 23, 2002 - 09:36   ET

THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.

THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
PAULA ZAHN, CNN ANCHOR: Turning now to the standoff in Bethlehem, where for three weeks, about 200 people, some of them children, have been holed up inside the Church of the Nativity. We've been trying to bring you a live report from Bethlehem about the first meeting between Israelis and Palestinians in two weeks trading to negotiate a peaceful resolution.

But for our correspondent Jonathan Vause, the story took a frightening turn just a short time ago, and he joins us now from Bethlehem with the details.

Good morning, John.

What happened?

JOHN VAUSE, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Hi, Paula.

We are coming out here on the balcony of our hotel which overlooks the Church of the Nativity. We're setting up to bring you that live report. And as we set up, we noticed an Israeli patrol in the street below us that arrested what looked like three men bound by the side of the road. And as we were observing then, they observed us, they raised their rifles, we backed off, and then we came out for another look, and that's when they fired one shot in our direction. It was warning shot, I guess was the best spin we could put on it. It went over our heads. It came very close though. In fact, it hit the beam just above us, and we saw some of the debris flying out from there.

It was only one shot, but it was certainly enough to get their message across that they didn't want us watching them while they were going about their business, and certainly it was a very unnerving feeling when you know that you can be exposed like that.

ZAHN: John, was it apparent to them that you were journalist working there?

VAUSE: I don't see how they could have any other idea that we're anything other than journalists. There's TV written all over. If we could just take a wide shot of the vest here, everything marked is with TV. We've got lights set up. And even so, under the rules which the Israelis have set up, they don't like people on the streets out of curfew. That's been imposed once again. so we were basically inside the hotel, abiding by their rules they've imposed upon everybody, even though the media have been allowed to walk around the streets in recent days. We were here in our hotel, away from the streets, away from the Church of the Nativity, abide by their rules, clearly marked. There are lights here. There was a cameramen. And still they decided to give us that warning shot.

ZAHN: So how will this effect the way you do your business, John?

VAUSE: I guess I will be a little bit more careful from now on. We've been fairly careful all the way through this. We've tried to keep our exposure here to a minimum. We've kept ourselves fairly discreetly away from the Israeli soldiers whenever we approach them. We walk up there very slowly. We put our arms out. We let them know that we're with the media. We let them know we're with CNN. We approach them in a very slow, gentle, well-mannered approach.

Whenever we see them on the roads, we let them know exactly what we are doing. In the bigger picture, though, we also let the Israeli Defense Forces know about our position and what we're doing in the area, and that we are in fact covering this story, and that they should be aware of our presence just as we're aware of their presence in this area.

I guess, from our point of view, we won't be putting our heads over the railing as much as we have been.

ZAHN: That's pretty scary stuff to have what you describe as a warning shot fired your way.

Meanwhile, we understand there might be some progress being made in the talks between Palestinian and Israeli negotiators over the status of the Church of the Nativity. Have we learned anything new?

VAUSE: Yes, Paula. That's the story we've been trying to cover here all day. The meeting broke up a couple of hours ago. Basically, they broke for lunch after quite a few hours of discussions. And during that break, one of the Palestinian negotiators came out and gave a promising picture of what was happening inside that meeting. He said that the Palestinians have put an offer on the table of those 30 wanted Palestinian men inside the church, putting forward this idea that they, in fact, be taken away to Gaza and the Palestinians deal with them there. And what they're saying that the Israelis certainly haven't rejected that outright, which is a promising sign, given the fact that the counteroffer from the Israelis was that they could -- those 30 men could either face court, face trial in Israel, or be deported to a third country.

So what will happen now is that the two parties will get together in about an hour and 15 minutes, once again, in that peace center, which is not far away from us. It's actually a building right on the Manger Square area, and it was built for the millennium. So they will get back together in about another hour and 15 minutes from now, and they will hear the Israeli response to that offer from the Palestinian negotiators. So maybe in a couple of hours later on, we should actually have some idea of where we are going with these negotiations, these negotiations to try to end that three-week standoff in the Church of the Nativity -- Paula.

ZAHN: All right, John Vause, thank you for that update. And I guess the lesson you learned, like you said, you can't get too near the edge of that balcony. Please stay safe.

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