Bethlehem. Tuesday PM, 25.4.06 Observers: Ruth O., Yael I. and Ilana D. (reporting) From 2:00 till 6:30 PMBeit Ummar, DCL Ezyon, WallajeThere was hardly any army presence along Road 60 and even at the second entrance to Al Aroub were no soldiers. We delivered a stack of paid fines from Haya to Abu Nassim.Never had we seen such crowds at the Ezyon DCL. The women’s toilets were clogged (and wet) a lovely entrance (but then there was only one woman among the many men, a blonde who was at the window and atually being serviced.According to the approx. 50 people waiting during the last hour no one had exited. One person had arrived at 4:00 AM and received number 82, number 40 was at the window. A chair blocked the entrance to the ‘inner vestibule’ where only ten people were allowed in close to the windows. One person had been back and forth daily for an entire week and had never even reached a window.Two Christian men came to complain that the soldiers had broken into their house and demolished two heavy metal doors before they had returned from Church at 9:00 PM yesterday. The soldiers had not taken anything and had left at 2:00 AM telling them to complain at Ezyon and demand compensation. The soldier was called Hayim. We referred them to the Ezyon Police Station.A man who needed to take his daughter with congenital heart failure to the Mokassed Hospital had not been able to reach a window. We called Dalia Bassem who told him to fax her the invitation to the Hospital. A Christian Student wanted to visit Jerusalem to attend Church and was refused because of the closure.We frantically called all the available numbers and finally an incomprehensible announcement was made over the loudspeaker. Some men understood the message, namely that they had to leave because the machine was broken and would not be fixed at least until to-morrow. Eyal (rifle drawn) came out accompanied by Amir trying to send everyone away and telling us that he would not talk to us amidst the crowds, because he didn’t want to be told off in their presence.He explained to us that the situation is far better than when the DCL reopened and promised that he would write a report and propose improvements after Independence Day. We asked that a note explaining the situation of the broken Biometric Card Issuing machine be posted on the door. We felt that he might have come and spoken to the men without our nudging and he retorted that he comes out about four times a day (risking his life), which is beyond his duties. He told us that his task is to serve the Palestinian population and that he is interested in making procedures as smooth as possible. We suggested that a special telephone number be made available to people who wanted to find out whether the DCL was closed because of the holidays or because of faulty and broken equipment, even only with up-to-date information and not manned. Some Palestinians suggested a process like in the Hebron DCO should be initiated where people are served according to their area of residence, so that a person from Beit Jalla would not be serviced on a day reserved for the inhabitants of Bethlehem. This seemed unfeasible to him. We hadn’t been in Wallaje for a long time and visited with Ahmed who keeps a little out of the politics of the village and is angry with some of the decisions taken by his neighbors. His sons were working and are owed huge sums by their former employer who is in financial trouble and doesn’t pay their wages. They have nowhere to turn, since they worked illegally. They wondered whether they would be able to obtain magnetic cards. His daughter in law has a blue Id. card and often visits with her gamily in Beit Hanina, but her children have been pulled out of the taxi when they came along one time during a holiday to see their grandparents. One of his daughters married a man from Sharafat and has Israeli citizenship, he cannot visit her, but she comes to them.