Anata, Qalandiya 18.1.2004 Watchers: Dalia R., Noah S. and Ilana D. (reporting) 6:30 AM. We first drove to Abu-Dis (although it was not officially our task for today) to encounter a blocked-off road in front of the huge crane ready to renew work close to the gas station. There were only a few pedestrians who had crossed over near the Cliff Hotel, one of the few spaces still left open to climbers. Those of us who had not yet seen this monstrosity were clearly in shock. The first graffiti sprayer had not managed to finish his welcoming words to the “Ghetto of Abu D“.We proceeded to Anata/Shuafat Refugee Camp where we encountered a very long line of cars on their way out to Jerusalem. Most were stopped and ordered to turn right before the checkpoint into an impromptu parking lot where another sort of inspection was being conducted: Here “government employees” in charge of the implementation of payment of the [governmental Israel Broadcast Authority] TV viewers’ fees took the documents of the drivers. Most had accumulated huge debts of several thousand shekels for nonpayment since around 1995. Neither they nor their cars were released unless they paid up on the spot or signed an undertaking to pay in monthly installments. Most claimed that they had never received a bill. The man heading the inspection team actually admitted that he didn’t enjoy his job. We queried the Border Police men on duty as to the legality of exploiting the Checkpoint for this purpose. They told us that every other day the place is used for the execution of court orders of some kind, such as the Social Security or the Internal Revenue to force people to pay up or have their cars confiscated. This matter has been reported in the media, and besides being appalled by the cynical additional abuse of the Checkpoint, there was nothing we could do.Ar-Ram was quiet and the queue of pedestrians and vehicles rather short.In Qalandiya-South we met with a huge silent crowd facing a closed Checkpoint. It had been shut down for no apparent reason some 20 minutes previously, and the tension was clearly rising every minute. About ten men whose identity documents had been taken almost an hour earlier were standing on the side and asked for our intervention. Due to the large crowd there was no way we could get near the two girls who held up the queue. In the distance we could see the same phenomenon on the North with similar numbers of people prevented from proceeding. Suddenly the Checkpoint was opened and people also started to arrive from the North and within a couple of minutes the queues had dispersed. The women IDF soldiers told us that they had had to close the Checkpoint for an “exercise” — but WHY at rush hour?The bold reservist in Qalandiya-North told us he was sorry his stint in the reserves would be over on Tuesday, he had enjoyed it. His duty had been to deal with irregular and humanitarian issues, which involved much responsibility. There is a new volunteer reservist who tried to provoke us and seemed very annoyed at our presence.Surda is open, and thanks to the dry weather since Thursday the lake to the North has disappeared.