Jubara, 12.1.04, morning Naomi L., Herziliya A., Tammi P., Edna M (reporting).7:00. The students are still on vacation, so we go directly to the check point. A first check with the check point commander: no curfew, but on the Tulkarm side there is a warning, and therefore we are forbidden to cross over to there but must stay in the middle of the check point. Also the porters, who make a sparse living by bringing trucks from one side of the check point to the other side, are forbidden to cross over. Altogether, there was continuous traffic from the three sides of the check point; especially to and from Jubara. We met the same Jubara resident who once lost his passage permit for his car because he transported in people in his car who didn’t have permits. Today he was in his vehicle with some agricultural produce for sale in Jubara. Another car, full of fruits and vegetables, belonging to a different Jubara resident, came through from Tulkarm without any problems. We met twice with pedestrians who were stopped near us concerning the problem of family unification. One was a doctor and lecturer at the univeristy who lives in Cfar Kadum (next to Kedumim, belonging to the Matak of Qalqiliya), whose wife and five children live in Tira, and he is not allowed to get a permit in order to visit them. The only way for them to meet is if they will come to visit him. This is a problem of family unification which needs to be solved in the Ministry of the Interior. The man knew that, but hoped that perhaps we could help him. The second case was a young woman who lives in Tulkarm and her husband lives in Tira. The woman passed with her brother and her baby girl over to the father, who was waiting on the other side of the check point in order to take the baby for medical treatment in Israel. The baby was handed over from the mother to the father, and the mother returned back to her other two children in Tulkarm. What an absurdity! We were witnesses to a yellow transit which was taking a family with a lot of children to the Allenby Bridge and were delayed from 4 AM at the check point for no clear reason. Our alertness and interest from afar perhaps brought it about that, a relatively short time after we were present at the check point, the transit was checked and on its way. Some ambulances and car from the Red Cross passed with no problems. A bus with many passengers was checked – all the men had to get off and show their documents, the women were spared the embarassment. Among the soldiers at the check, one who was conspicuous was a middle-aged man (apparently a volunteer) who was concentrating very hard on protecting his weapon, which was aimed at the Palestinians passing through, and giving constant warnings to the soldier that he should be on guard and, at every opportunity, warning Palestinians that they should move back. When we were learning, we noticed a boy detained on the side. He only spoke Arabic. Since at the same time the representative of the Matak arrived who speaks Arabic, we asked him to find out from the boy what was happening. He did this and we hope that they released him without too much delay. Trucks back-to-back, Tulkarm-Irtah: a longer line than usual, angry and tense drivers. It seems that because of that same warning, they are only allowing one truck to enter the area of loading and unloading and all the others had to wait until that one finished the transfer of goods. Meanwhile, the skies clouded over and one of the trucks, with 15 tons of flour, had only a cloth covering, and a pickup with logs of wood had no covering. We rang the Matak and it turned out that the representative was already at the check point and he was indeed speeding up the entrance of the trucks. At 9:30, we left. Edna