How does one tell a story that has been told millions and billions of times throughout the millennia?

Finding new and interesting ways to talk about Christmas in the Holy Land can be a challenge.

Last year, British graffiti artist Banksy brought a new dynamic to Christmas by hosting his annual "Santa's Ghetto" exhibition/sale/political statement in Bethlehem.

This year there was no Banksy, so reporters searched for other ways to tell the tale.

Perhaps the most inventive, and time-consuming, approach came from Aleem Maqbool of the BBC.

In past years, UK reporters have noted that, if Mary and Joseph were to try and trek from Nazareth to Bethlehem today, they would have to get through a network of Israeli checkpoints. 

In 2005, the BBC itself was among the UK media outlets to report on the checkpoints, a story that drew the ire of the Israeli government. 

This year, the BBC went one step farther as Maqbool literally recreated the journey by riding a donkey from Nazareth to Bethlehem.

To be precise, on the 10-day journey, Maqbool actually rode five donkeys, as the Israeli authorities prevented donkeys from going through various checkpoints, telling the BBC that the donkey paperwork was not in order.

The donkey denials brought to mind one of Banksy's most famous Bethelem works, a silhouette of a soldier checking the paperwork of a donkey.

Some Palestinians failed to appreciate the irony and painted over the Banksy political statement, which some saw as the artist comparing Palestinians to donkeys, a cutting insult in these parts.

This year, a reporter from Der Spiegel noted that the remaining Banksy pieces remain tourist attractions. 

Over at The World, reporter Quil Lawrence raises a provocative question: Was Jesus Christ actually born in a different place? 

Quil's piece looks at archaeological evidence that Jesus was actually born in what is now northern Israel in a place called Bethlehem of Galilee, which is actually much closer to Nazareth than the Bethlehem widely recognized as Christ's birthplace.

Over at the CBC, in a print piece titled "A quarrelsome lot, these Christians," Peter Armstrong writes about the ever-surreal disputes in the Church of the Holy Sepulchre that lead to frequent skirmishes between the various religious denominations uneasily sharing Christianity's holiest site.

The AP's Pulitzer Prize-winning photog Mohammed Muheisen captured this only-in-the-Middle-East image today of a Palestinian protester using a sling shot to hurl stones at Israeli soldiers during a protest against the West Bank separation barrier.

On a more festive note, The New York Times notes (as also noted here)  that life for Palestinians in the West Bank is slowly getting better. 

The piece ends with this quote from Bethlehem Governor Salah Tamari: “Israelis are paranoid because of their past, while Palestinians are paranoid because of their present. But we are doomed to live together or blessed to live together, depending on your point of view."

(Photo of Banksy graffiti: Yossi Zamir/Flash90)