BETHLEHEM, West Bank - Palestinian gunmen, some waving or flashing V-signs, walked out of the Church of the Nativity today, marking the end of a 39-day standoff with Israeli troops at one of Christianity's holiest shrines.
The men emerged one by one from the low-slung Gate of Humility, the basilica's main door, into the bright sunlight of Manger Square. Two were brought out on stretchers, and one man briefly dropped to the ground, kneeling in prayer.
In a deal reached yesterday with European negotiators, the 13 militants were being deported to European countries and another 26 were being transferred to the Gaza Strip. Eighty-five Palestinian civilians and policemen were to be released, while 10 pro-Palestinian activists who slipped into the church were also being deported.
The deal cleared the way for Israeli forces to withdraw from the last West Bank city they occupy, but did not spell an end to bloodshed. Even as the evacuation took place, Israeli tanks stood poised outside the Gaza Strip ahead of an expected retaliatory attack for a suicide bombing that killed 15 Israelis.
Israel's siege over Christ's reputed birthplace was one of the focal points of its West Bank invasion, and ending it became an international cliffhanger of on-again, off-again breakthroughs.
The crisis began April 2, when more than 200 people fled into the church ahead of invading Israeli troops. Israel insisted that the gunmen among them must surrender, but dropped that demand when the Palestinians agreed that 13 of the senior militants would be deported and others sent to Gaza.
Arduous negotiations characterized the effort to defuse the standoff until a breakthrough came yesterday.
Shortly before 7 a.m. today the first Palestinian emerged - Bethlehem intelligence chief Abdullah Daoud, the most senior in the group and slated for exile.
Others followed in a slow but steady stream, some waving to Palestinian civilians watching from nearby rooftops. Several women holding babies shouted to them, "My beloved sons, may God bless you."
Among the 13 to be deported are nine members of the Al Aqsa Martyrs Brigade, a militia linked to Palestinian leader Yasser Arafat's Fatah movement, and nine members of the Islamic militant group Hamas. The 13th is Daoud, the intelligence chief.
Arafat came under scathing criticism from Fatah and Hamas for approving the deportations - a first in the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. Israel has expelled hundreds of Palestinian activists since the 1967 Middle East war, but always in a unilateral move.
