Qalandiya

05:45  we arrive  at  the C.P.  which is very noisy even though it is  not that full.  The usual, young guys  pushing  relentlessly, the humanitarian gate is closed  and we feel helpless, since  this is almost  inevitably the case  at this time of morning.  The older people  and those who refuse to expose themselves to this aggressive  handling  , wait on  the benches.  It is still dark  and there is ONE  neon  light only that  still works.  Nobody, apparently  thinks it might be worth putting some fresh lights in.  The only soldier in the cell  decides to educate  the  Palestinians  and  demands that they be  QUIET, uskut, he shouts at them  and does not  open the cages.
We call the  DCO  twice  and finally after  6  a.m.  Saffa  , the DCO  officer  arrives  and the situation improves  immediately.
The  humanitarian gate opens, the soldier in the cell  is replaced ,  the line becomes civilized  and by 07:30  all have  passed.
Some workers told us  they were there  since  04:30.   If it is a known fact  that  they start work at  7 a.m.  and  usually still have a way to go from  Qalandiya, why  this torturous  ritual  every morning , of  not opening all 5  security check points  and  making it possible  to pass  earlier  and in a humane manner?

   13:30 - 16:00  Road 443

In preparation of a talk about MachsomWatch for students of the Hebrew University Secondary School (“Leyada”) before their army service, we decided to devote part of the lecture to the absurd situation and condition of Road 443 and take pictures on the way. At the ‘observation’ point of the ‘fabric of  life’ sunken road near the New Giv’on were a number of Border Police jeeps with many officers who very politely asked us whether they could be of any help and warned us not to approach the ‘dangerous’ road.

We tried to turn off at the first exit after the Ofer CP but found that the newly painted arrows on the road led to a fence and stopping was not only extremely difficult, but also very dangerous.

There were some concrete blocks and a huge heap of garbage between Road 443 and a parallel Palestinian road where three cabs were waiting for a chance of a passenger. Two had yellow license plates, but are not allowed to enter Israel (or even the small part of Road 443), the third with a Palestinian license is allowed to travel the few kilometers on road 443, but it is not worth his while because of the hassle of the strict security. His car costs ten times as much as the others, because it is a registered taxi with the Palestinian authority. The other cars are lucky if they make thirty shekels a day. The economic situation is atrocious.

We took some pictures of the construction of the “Institutionalization” of the Kiryat Sefer passage, but unfortunately, because of the long line of impatient cars behind us we were unable to take a picture of the sign which directs “non-Israeli” vehicles to the left (where the passage was closed off) and Israeli vehicles to the right. On the way back beyond the Kharbata (Maccabee) CP there is still no pedestrian crossing at the exit of the road which is blocked off and where many cars were awaiting returning workers. However the sign which does not allow unauthorized crossing is VERY prominent (see picture). And of course no pedestrian crossing exists. We took some more pictures of signs on the road back such as the one for Israelis: If you got here;  you made a  mistake - turn back! And telling Palestinians that this is the last spot they are allowed to turn off from the road.

The Ofer CP now has six lanes and construction is still going on, we took a shot from above from the road towards Givat Ze’ev .

 trans. Judith Green

6:00

This morning the biting wind and freezing cold became the ordinary chill of winter.

Long and quiet lines al the way to the parking lot.  At this hour, dozens of people keep coming, on their way to work.  Soon the students will also arrive.  Is this going to go on, unchanging, forever?

The Ecumenical volunteer tells us that one lane was closed for a short time, immediately causing a delay in the process, and the line increased and seems completely unbearable.  But everyone is quiet and experienced, recognizing a more brutal hand controlling things today at the checkpoint.  In a few minutes, the officer from the DCO arrives and then a police officer as well.  The Humanitarian gate will be opened from now on, every few minutes, and hundreds of people will pass through it as though everything is normal.  And maybe we are mistaken, and they are actually on their way to the train (and maybe Israeli Railroads is actually working the checkpoints?)  After the difficult morning hour, everyone goes forward and there is a feeling of common relief surrounds the checkpoint and the various people waiting there - today, there is a chance of arriving in time and have a transient feeling of being in a different country.

  Children - for almost an hour, between 6:15-7:10 - 90 children went through the checkpoint.  Mostly teenagers, some of them elementary school children, and a few small children with their parents.  When the Humanitarian gate is open in a regular fashion, the feeling is different, everyone is relaxed and pleasant and greets each other with "shalom".

Translating: Ruth Fleishman

Qalandiya checkpoint:
A witness told me about a man who walked into the vehicle checkpoint, soldiers shouted at him from afar to stop, the man didn't stop, he waved an axe above his head and kept walking. Fires were shot in the air. The man kept walking. They shot at him. They hit his leg, he fell.
"It was a mess". The witness said: "Tonnes of soldiers came. They closed the checkpoint for about half an hour. The poor man was done for. He must have wanted to die, now he will go to prison…".

The separation forced upon the Palestinians of the West Bank from their relatives in the Gaza Strip prevents them from sharing the good and the bad.
Five young men arrived at the Palestinian side of the checkpoint to pay their last respect to a relative from Gaza who hadn't survived the operation he went through in Nablus.
Each one entered separately the back side of the Palestinian ambulance where the body of the deceased was, they each took a couple of minutes to be alone with the dead man, and when they came out their faces were soaking wet from tears.
Only then, after the last one got out, the ambulance crosse

d the checkpoint and the body of the deceased was transferred into the Israeli ambulance that was waiting to taken to burial in his home town.

Jaba checkpoint:

The rain that was diluted by ice flacks and the temperatures that dropped near to zero degrees drove the soldiers away to their posts. For the first time in years there were no rifle barrels pointing at human beings and no one looking out for the settlers' safety.

Chana S. translating

5.30 The queue reaches the parking lot. Only 3 sleeves open and the line hardly moves.
6.00 We phoned the DCO and were told that an officer would come in 2 minutes.  He indeed arrived but told us that he wasn’t responsible for the soldiers so he would call their commander to hurry them.   When we once again called the DCO and asked for that commander we were told it was impossible to talk to him.  Once again they explained politely that the soldier of the DCO was under the command of an officer (who apparently was new to the area), who himself was not responsible for the soldiers.  When we asked what was the logic of the responsible person’s not being at the site, we were asked (by a border policewoman) not to disturb their work.
6.15 All the sleeves were opened but the 5th sleeve, intended for people passing through the humanitarian gate, was fairly empty.  The pofficer to whom we suggested that  workers be directed also to this sleeve, explained that at present they were trying to work out how to make the passage more efficient (hallelujah).
A pleasant woman officer of the Border Police that they are trying to improve the passages and widen(?) them.  If they are indeed planning to widen them it seems to us that the first thing they should do is widen those narrow corridors before the carousels.  Expanding them would greatly improve the feeling of workers who complain that they feel like animals in a cage.
6.30 The lines rapidly get shorter.  We also got the impression that the army and the border police discussed the situation and checked changes in procedure.
7.10  The line was short as we left.
As this report was being written it was reported in the news that a Palestinian attacked soldiers with an axe at Qalandiya checkpoint (10.15). 

Translator:  Charles K.

The scene – a jubilant flock of starlings chirps innocently in the sky above the fence.

The gate leading to A-Ram at the southern plaza opened and closed repeatedly during our entire shift, the cars sent there by police officers.  Sometimes all the cars were sent to A-Ram, sometimes drivers were able to choose between entering via the Qalandiya checkpoint or directly to A-Ram.  When we asked one of the police officers for an explanation, he replied that “he’s not the Israeli Police spokesman.”  Apparently it’s to control the amount of traffic at the northern plaza.

A man waiting for someone at the southern plaza is arguing with police officers next to the gate to a-Ram.  They wanted him to move away.  He was very upset and yelled at the police officers and guards.  We were surprised how aggressive he was, unusual for someone confronting an armed guard or a police officer.  “I’m from Abu Ghosh,” he said, “not one of these Indians!” (referring to the Palestinians).  Two guards also arrived, more forgiving.  At one point another Palestinian showed up, saying to the police officers, “He’s with me,” which ended the argument.  Apparently they had a special “status.”

At 16:10, a Red Crescent ambulance from the Red Crescent station on the Mount of Olives arrived at the minibus parking lot south of the checkpoint.  The station has only five ambulances with yellow license plates.  
We then see an ambulance from Jenin arriving and being inspected.  The southern ambulance is waiting for a 22-day-old newborn in critical condition, intubated, in an incubator, who’ll be accompanied by a doctor and perhaps by a family member as well.  
Inspecting the ambulance from Jenin took seven minutes.  “You should be here every day,” the driver said to us jokingly.
The incubator with the infant is transferred on a stretcher, “back to back;” the ambulance leaves for the Maqasid Hospital, siren wailing.
The ambulance from Jenin moves to the parking lot at the northern plaza.  Its crew waits for the Jerusalem ambulance to return from Maqasid with the accompanying doctor and the incubator, both of which will return to Jenin.

A driver at the checkpoint leading to Ramallah says, “I don’t believe I’ve waited here half an hour every day for five years and haven’t gotten mad!  Ten years ago I wouldn’t have believed things would be like this, and that I’d get used to it!”
The drivers of the minibuses going to Jerusalem, waiting at the checkpoint intended solely for residents of Jerusalem, explained how things work, as of today:  “Everyone, except for someone who’s handicapped and must be carried, everyone has to get off the minibus, walk through the checkpoint and be inspected, and is then allowed to return to the minibus.”  “Everyone,” including the elderly, infants and even those with handicap certificates (Remember:  it’s terribly cold at Qalandiya in the winter).

Unfortunately, all the positive things we wrote and told our colleagues about Qalandiya over the past two weeks were wiped out this morning. While still out in the parking lot at 06:00 we could hear the dawn shouts of protests of the Qalandiya we know and despair of. Long lines led into the three cage-like passages before the first turnstiles, and there was already a small crowd by the Humanitarian Gate, although all five checking stations were open. It was so cold that ink in my pen froze. When we arrived there were two officers on duty, one from the blue police and the other from the Civil Administration. Our colleague from the EAPPI (Ecumenical volunteers from Europe), who had been there since 04:30, told us that the problem began at about 05:00 due to the inefficiency and lack of interest of the woman soldier in charge of opening the turnstiles. The police officer arrived at 05:30; the Civil Administration officer entered at 06:00 and opened the Humanitarian Gate. Thereafter another two Civil Administration officers joined the group. One of them, known to us as very professional― who had told us the week before about the efforts being made to improve the management of the checkpoint―approached us, apparently in chagrin, to joke that only when we turn up is there a mess at Qalandiya and asked us never to return.

At 07:00 the lines leading into the three passages still extended to the back of the covered area, but each time the Humanitarian Gate was opened the entire crowd in front of it was allowed through. At 07:20, when we left, the situation had calmed considerably as the lines barely extended beyond the three cage-like passages and more people were being allowed through the turnstiles each time they opened. We waited only a short time to drive through the vehicle passage, and we could see that the line for Jerusalem I.D. holders was reasonably short, though the bitter cold and strong wind certainly added no pleasure to their wait.

It was a cold and clear afternoon in Jerusalem.  Very few people were at the CPs.  We reached Anata CP at 3:45 PM.  Once again we saw a stream of people returning home, beyond the Wall, but almost no one emerging in the opposite direction to enter Jerusalem.  The examinations in the vehicle CP did not take very long and traffic appeared to be moving.

We continued to Qalandiya CP.  Very few people were there as well.  Only one passageway was operating when we arrived, but another was opened shortly thereafter.  A young mother with three small children was standing in Passageway 4.  She entered the examination area with them when her turn arrived, but she was not allowed through.  When she came back, she told us that the children were not recorded in her Palestinian I.D. card, only in the Israeli card of her husband, only he could bring the children into Jerusalem where they all live.  The woman herself holds a personal permit that doesn't include the children.  "It's the will of Allah" she told us with a despairing shrug of her shoulders.Then she phoned her husband, who must have been waiting for them nearby, because he came quickly and shepherded his whole family through the CP. 

Translation: Ruth Fleishman

We were last in line, waiting for the turnstiles to open so that we could pass into the inner inspection area. Neither we nor the people before us had noticed that the soldiers' post had been abandoned and the revolving mechanism was disconnected. Only one child who had passed through the gate before his mother had, stood on the other side, all alone, there was no going forward or backward. The child was entrapped.
During the first moments the child smiled with embarrassment, and then the smile was replaced by a worried gaze. He brought his body closer to his mother who was standing on the other side of the metal bars, took her hand and grabbed it tightly like a life preserving anchor.
The Palestinians, who are used to the arbitrariness by which the place is run, moved to the parallel inspection lane with acceptance. We stayed with the mother, cetin that within a minute or two the problem would be resolved. After all everything that happens in the checkpoint is filmed and broadcasted live to the plasma screens of those who run the site.
We were wrong.

The tears that started streaming down the cheeks of the child caused us to hurry and make some calls. We thought that as soon as we inform the hot lines the child would be released.
We were wrong again.

They all gave us the same answer: "I'm making inquiries".
We called again: "I'm making inquiries".
After twenty minutes, after having promised the mother and her son that "any moment now…"- "they will just look at their camera and someone will come and press the button…", "But I've only now explained to them, they are making inquiries and it will all be alright…", we understood that there was no telling how long the child will remain entrapped and detached from his mother, and Roni went to the parallel lane to request the help of the soldier sitting there, while I stayed with the mother and kept trying to talk to the people at the hot lines who over and over again could understand and connected me with the officer in charge, who also didn't understand and we ended up having an incomprehensive dialog.
-    The officer: "what is the name of his mother?"
-    Me: "I don't know"
-    The officer: "how will I identify him?"
-    Me: "He has two legs… why do you need to identify him?- just let go!!"
-    The officer: "wait, I don't understand, explain again, is he in the red zone?- where does he want to go to?"

Nearly thirty minutes later a solider from the offices was sent to press the releasing button. But before pressing he insisted on explaining that actually: "the child is to blame. He shouldn't have passed to the other side on his own". Not only was it the victims fault, but it was possible to prolong his suffering and put forth the occupier's narrative.

No one believes the Palestinians. That's why they are always equipped with a bundle of documents that prove their disabilities, their situation and their very existence.
Such was the 71 year old person from Jerusalem, a disabled and sick man who has difficulty walking and waiting in the cramped lines of Qalandiya only makes it harder for him.
The man presented before us his disability certificate, as proof of his bad health and told us how he is mistreated at the passage for residents of Jerusalem, where in spite regulations that allow the disabled elderly and pregnant women to remain seated in the bus, he is force to come down, walk to the pedestrians' checkpoint, stand in line, pass the turnstiles and be inspected (again) by the soldier.
"Write down what I'm telling you. Write it down"- he asked.

6:20: Due to Ina's experience on Monday of last week, we decided to arrive somewhat later, and indeed, perhaps it's better without us…The queues weren't very long, those waiting were calm and proceeding quickly, and the humanitarian gate was opened whenever required, with the separate lane being observed. The atmosphere was much more calm.
In the inner courtyard there were a few officers, police and civil administration. They explained their efforts to improve the passage.
The younger kids had a few days off – "preparing for exams", so there were mainly  teenagers passing through.
It's very cold and windy in Qalandiya, affecting the people having to wait there. We noticed an easy chair in a corner of the parking lot – by the time we left it was still covered with frost.