Za’atara Hawwara Beit Furik Awarta, Monday 6.11.06 AMObservers: Tal A., Micky F., Ada H. (reporting)07.25 – Marda & Zeita – Gates opened. 07.40 – Zaatra – 36 cars from the West. 2 checking lines: 1 for buses and the other for private cars. The day’s orders: Nablus citizens aged 18-25 are not crossing. Today the soldiers have a hot warning! Drivers say they are waiting no longer than half an hour. Soldiers are polite and let people cross after short check ups. Passengers of some cars have to get out the car and show their naked belly.From the North – A long line of cars coming from Hawwara. No way one can see the end of the line. Lots of people wait on the side. 3 check lines. One of them manned by MPs without nametags. Their commander who sees us the first time, seems to be suspicious of us. He calls his commander and lets Tal, the CP commander talk to him expecting him to send us away, but he explains him and promises him to send help. After a while he mollified and spoke with us. A bus driver says he waited here about 3 hours. We count checking time and it takes about 3 minutes for each car to be checked. The bus’ passengers have to get off, even little children, and wait until the bus is checked as well as their IDs. Its take another half an hour. Pedestrians are not allow to cross (because of a fear about a bomb! But this fear does not exist while ordering passengers get out of the bus……). The soldiers check carefully and the female soldier with the dog is there.09.10 – Beit Furik – Almost empty. A very small number of pedestrians and cars. The taxi drivers say there are no problems today. The CP commander, S, says all Beit Furik and Beit Dajan and all the olive pickers are allowed to cross without any documents. There is one detainee who, according the soldiers, tried to bypass the CP, was caught and panelized. The detainee says he is worried because it might rain and he would not have time to pick enough olives. 40 minutes later he is dismissed. A female soldier with a dog is checking cars.A woman, once from Farodis, came to the CP with a one month old baby and her husband of 20 years. For the last 20 years she lived with her husband in Beit Furik but did not change her address to Beit Furik. The baby is sick and she needs a doctor. But because she has an Israeli ID she is not allowed to cross. She is begging to the soldiers but they refuse and say they can recommend some good Israeli physicians. We called the Humanitarian Center and Saray referred us to officer M. who deals with Arabs who carry Israeli IDs ( Tel: 02-530398). M. did help them to cross, but just for that day. She told us to refer the woman to the authorities and make it right. 10.25 – Awarta – A little more work there. Full lories on both sides. A. says there are no special problems.11.00 – Hawwara – A long line of cars from Nablus to Hawwara. A small number of pedestrians. One detainee is there. He is waiting 10 minutes because the soldiers found his newspaper “ Alrasalla” (means: The Letter or The mission) which is printed in Gaza and distributed in the west bank. We called the Moked again to find out if it’s legal to detain some one for having this newspaper. Saray said he was detained because of another reason which she can not tell us, maybe something the man has in the newspaper. Few minutes later he was released but without the newspaper.11.28 – A bus we noticed when we arrived is now being checked. The passengers were told to leave the bus, their begs were taken out, put on the ground but checked on a table. From time to time one soldier assists the people to lift their begs and put them on the table. 11.35 -the bus is released. The soldiers behave politely with the Palestinians and don’t keep them unnecessarily. But the checking of the cars coming from Nablus is thorough and lasts a long time.