Hostility against Christians in Israel is dramatically rising. A newly released quarterly report from the Religious Freedom Data Center (RFDC), an independent volunteer network in Jerusalem, shows that anti-Christian harassment nearly doubled in the second quarter of 2026. Between April and June, the center documented 83 acts of harassment across 76 separate incidents, a massive spike from the 44 documented in the first quarter.
Christian Zionists want to treat this like a series of random, isolated bad days. The receipts show otherwise. This is a systematic, culturally tolerated effort to push Christian presence out of the public square.
Spitting, Assault, and State-Sanctioned Silence
Of the 83 documented acts, spitting remains the weapon of choice, accounting for 56% of all recorded incidents (47 cases). What used to be done in the shadows is now done openly, in broad daylight, and often in front of children. In several documented instances, Jewish parents were caught on camera spitting and shouting insults at clergy while actively encouraging their own children to do the same.
But the harassment is rapidly escalating past mere public insults. The RFDC documented deep physical violence and targeted subversion:
- Physical Assault on Mount Zion: On April 28, a Jewish man ran from a distance and violently charged into a Catholic nun near the Room of the Last Supper, knocking her to the ground and injuring her.
- Supermarket Defilement: On April 16, a monk shopping at an “Osher Ad” supermarket in Talpiot was approached by a man shouting “Get out of the country” while instructing a nearby child to tell the monk, “May you die.”
- Desecrating Milestones: On May 23, vandals targeted the Room of the Last Supper on Mount Zion, deliberately bending and breaking the branches of an olive tree sculpture presented by Pope John Paul II for the Millennium.
- Vandalism on the Gospel Trail: On June 17, during a school trip by students from the Karmei Katif Yeshiva, a student deliberately spat on a stone cairn along the Galilee’s Gospel Trail after an instructor explained it was a Christian pilgrimage route.
- Online Incitement to Burn Churches: On June 16, digital zealots targeted online platforms. Google Maps reviews for prominent sites like Dormition Abbey and the Church of St. Alexander Nevsky were flooded with reviews quoting legalistic commands from Deuteronomy, calling for the destruction, demolition, and burning of Christian places of worship.
The Establishment is Coddling the Hostility
Where is the defense for these Christians? Certainly not from the local municipality.
The RFDC report explicitly calls out the Jerusalem Municipality for its passive-aggressive erasure of Christian existence. From the Municipal Compound to the Jaffa Gate, public walls are plastered with Jewish historical promotions, holiday greetings, and projections. Yet, there is zero visible, symbolic representation of the Christian presence in the public quarters. When tourists and students enter the Armenian Quarter, there is no signage indicating they are entering a historically Christian space.
Even worse, the report details that the Israelis are actively providing digital real estate to extremists. The Jerusalem Municipality’s official website links directly to the “King David’s Tomb” website, a domain run by the Ministry of Religious Affairs that actively disseminates adversarial narratives portraying the local Christian presence and the Vatican as immediate threats to Mount Zion.
It credits school children who are bussed into Jerusalem on state-funded field trips with zero education on the ancient Christian presence in the Middle East, reacting with immediate, unvetted hostility. It is a predictable pipeline: institutional erasure breeds public ignorance, and public ignorance breeds physical violence.
For years, Christian leaders have punched right at anyone warning about these rising cultural tensions, choosing to appeal to Judeo-Christian values despite the oxymoronic nature. The Israeli authorities and local police continue to treat these 83 incidents as minor social friction rather than a coordinated campaign of religious intimidation.
