PEOPLE in Durham are being invited to sign a giant Christmas card expressing sympathy and solidarity with the people of Palestine.

The County Durham Palestine Solidarity Campaign will be collecting signatures when members run a Christmas stall in Durham Market Place tomorrow, between 11am and 3pm.

The names will be added to the card that will be taken to Bethlehem at Christmas by the Archbishop of Canterbury, the Right Reverend Rowan Williams, and Cardinal Cormac Murphy-O'Connor, head of the Roman Catholic Church in Britain.

They are visiting the town of Christ's birth as a gesture of solidarity with the Palestinians, many of them Christians, who, campaigners say, are imprisoned by the security wall and checkpoints built by Israel. The wall has been declared illegal by the International Court of Justice.

The campaign's vice-chairwoman, Thea Khamis, of Stanley, who is from a Palestinian Christian family, said: "The apartheid wall is dividing families, ruining agriculture and commerce, and destroying the tourism business in Bethlehem.

"The Israelis are creating ghettos as part of their strategy of ethnic cleansing in the occupied territories.''

People will be able to buy festive cards designed by Durham artist Mike Attewell at the stall.