The Bethlehem Home museum was founded in 1972 by the Women’s Union in a typical Palestinian house just a few minutes from Manger Square. The museum displays a photographic collection of Palestine from the early 1900s and a reconstruction of a typical Bethlehem living room, where all the eating, sleeping and entertaining would have taken place. There is also a typical kitchen, with a display of traditional cooking implements. A much older house exhibits native costumes and jewellery, as well as rugs, cushions and other embroideries. Embroidery produced by the members of the Women’s Union can be purchased in the gift shop upstairs, along with various other homemade products.
The union was founded in 1947 as a charitable, social and cultural society, and has since organised many projects, including the Bethlehem museum. The society is composed of 13 women in the executive committee and an unlimited number in the general committee, currently around 80. They launched an embroidery centre in 1968, to provide work for the needy women and to preserve the traditional embroidery. After training, the women are given work to take home and do in their own time, between caring for children and other tasks. When it is completed they return to the centre to be paid, and are given more work to do. During the Second Intifada which began in September 2000, the Union focussed all its efforts on helping those in distress, particularly by keeping the embroidery centre running.
Admission: 8 shekels. Opening hours: 8am – midday (Monday-Saturday) and 2pm-5pm (Monday-Wednesday, Friday and Saturday).
For more information visit the Arab Women’s Union at www.bethawu.org