THE Serbs' holy Jerusalem, the Kosovan cradle of their culture and religion, is under siege, threatened by Albanian fighters ready to torch the symbol of their oppression. 
The 14th century walled monastery of St Dmitri is the Serbs' last toehold in a burnt and pillaged land. Here, camped inside the gates under the shady trees the last few elderly Serb women, bruised and traumatised, wait for safe escort out of Kosovo, their houses burning, their menfolk dead, their families long gone. The monks do what they can to shelter and comfort them; but they, too, are prisoners in the tranquil stone monastery. 
Soon the cupolas and churches of this historic site, two miles from the smashed and blackened town, will be the only reminder that Serbs ever lived in this part of Kosovo. Almost all have gone, fleeing reprisals and retribution. About 1,000 sought sanctuary in the monastery a week ago; most have been escorted over the mountains to Montenegro by Italian Kfor troops. Some of those who were killed before reaching safety, including a mentally handicapped woman raped and killed five days ago, lie buried in freshly Pec is the holiest religious site for Serbs, the traditional seat of the patriarchate and the centre of their medieval Balkan kingdom. It was also the town that saw some of the worst atrocities during the Kosovo war: the police and paramilitaries were among the most violent and brutal, determined to crush the strong support for the Kosovo Liberation Army and cleanse this symbol of Serbian nationhood of its ethnic Albanian population. 
Now the refugees are returning to this once bustling market town to find the bodies of relatives thrown down wells, their houses roofless and charred, dead animals in the fields and the streets covered in glass and stinking, smouldering garbage. They are taking their revenge, despite the attempts of the Italians to stop the looting and burning of Serb houses, ablaze in the surrounding hills. 

Patriarch Pavle, the head of the Serbian Orthodox Church, has left Belgrade to take up permanent residence in the embattled monastery. The Church, accused of giving tacit backing to some of Belgrade's most violent nationalists, is now doing what it can to save Serb honour. The 85-year-old patriarch, bowed and frail, yesterday spoke out again to condemn all ethnic cleansing, while begging Nato to protect the few remaining Serbs in Kosovo.