As usual I left Tel Aviv at 05:00 AM together with two volunteers.   We arrived in Ein Al Hilweh a little before 07:00 and went to visit F.  We found him lying on the sofa exhausted and broken by the death of his son.  He did not even greet us.  His daughter F. prepared tea for us and we stayed for a short time.  We could barely speak to each other because she does not know Hebrew and we only understand a few words in Arabic.

It began to drizzle and then rain began to pour, so F. decided not to go to the well to water the cows.
When the rain stopped we went to Z.’s house.  We helped him feed hay to the cows, which was covered with plastic and compost that Z’s brother had dug from the ground.

We received a phone call and were asked to come to Hamam Al Malikh because the army had arrived.  When we got there we found a car with four Americans who were extremely tense.   Several soldiers were attempting to verify their identity. None of them answered my questions in regard to what was going on.   It became clear that they had a flat tire and had managed to fix it.

Two more volunteers joined us in the car.  We offered to take the Americans to the nearest garage to repair the tire while the other car remained near the tent site with the soldiers.   Afterwards when we met the Americans again at Samra  they explained that they belonged to ISM, the International Solidarity Movement.  They had slept at Hamam Al Malikh  and when they had prepared to leave there was a problem with their car.   The army took advantage of the situation and entered the tent site, which the Americans had been attempting to prevent.  After we left the soldiers remained a bit longer and then left.  .

.We drove to Samra at noon.  The previous day settlers had come from the outpost belonging to Uri Cohn.  Some were on horseback and some were driving ATVs and they attempted to scare the flocks.    They ran over several sheep on the road.   We found several more volunteers there from ISM who told us what had occurred during the morning.   They left and an hour later we also left for Ein Al Hilweh to water the animals in the afternoon.

The evening and night passed without incident, perhaps because of the rain.  However, in the morning people from Z’s tent site discovered that Bentzi, the settler from the outpost of Maskiyot had come and broken the corral surrounding the cows.  They thought that he had only passed by and therefore did not call for help while I was sleeping in the nearby   Luckily we found that none of the cows had left the corral.