AZZUN, DEIR BALLUT, Wednesday 9 June 2004 AMObservers: Michal P.S., Orit B., Shalva C., Miriam, Hanna A. (reporting) colour = red>06:55 —We drove to the checkpoint at Deir Ballut, after being told that there were problems there. It wasn’t open yet ( other checkpoints open, at least officially, at 06:00). It is located at what passes for a junction between the road leading to Deir Ballut village and the road ( twisting and in bad repair) to As-Sawiya (a village in the news recently following demonstrations against the building of the “security” or separation fence, during which people have been injured by rubber bullets, according to Palestinian testimony) and to Azzun Atma. There were relatively few cars waiting on the two roads. Those who spoke good Hebrew explained that they’d been waiting more than an hour so that they could continue their journey to Ramallah. They said the checkpoint was usually opened at 07:30 but perhaps because we were there, it might open earlier. And indeed at 07:00 the soldiers (reservists) opened it and we waited for the convoy to go through.09:10 —Near Azzun Atma; we were on the “Jewish” road [a road intended exclusively for the use of Israeli-Jewish settlers in the occupied territories]. Coming in the opposite direction, we saw three women and several soldiers beside them. By the time we reached them, the women had joined the men standing there. The exit from the village to this road is blocked. The villagers told us that the village’s “official” checkpoint is on the other side and gives access only to neighboring villages. They can obtain permits at Kedumim.One of them, aged 49 and the father of 14 children, told us of an incident several months ago when he was beaten by soldiers. He was on his way to Nablus to his wife, who was staying there. The soldiers claimed he’d tried to snatch a rifle from one of them.The women complained that the soldiers harass them, and confiscate documents and mobile phones. One young woman, mother of three, looked stunned and lost and was in tears. Her friend told us that the soldiers had taken her mobile phone. Her husband had called and the soldiers told him: “We’re fucking her.” And one of the soldiers asked her: “Why does your husband send you to work?” These women try to earn some money by cleaning in the local villages; their husbands are unemployed. Another woman, with a two-month-old baby, said she had taken the baby for a check-up and the soldiers had taken her permit and sent it to the District Co-ordinating Office, to someone called Salman. Since then it had vanished and she’d been trying to locate it for a week. She also told us of another incident in which a Border Police jeep had driven through her village, detained her and made her stand in the sun; then one of them had pointed to the ground and said: “All this is for the Jews.”